Do Canonical Tags Pass Link Juice?

[bill369]

I have an ecommerce website where some pages link to a product page with a different URL.

EXAMPLE:

1: /category/product1.html (not indexed by Google) with canonical pointing to product1.html

Other page link to the product like below.

2: product1.html (indexed by Google)

Now the question is, does 1: pass any link juice to product1.html or not? Is it worth to change everything and link only to one URL? My site is running on Magento!

[GastonRiera]

Hello Bill369,

I do not know about link juice, whether is passed or not. For that you should use a 301 redirection.
As for ranking, it DOES pass PR (Page Rank, something used internally in google search engine algorithms).

Remember always to point canonicals to pages that have the same user intent, not just canonicalize some pages in order to gain that page "link strength".
Here some other Q&A:

Does Canonical Tag passes link juice to the original URL? - Moz Q&A
Does rel= canonical combine link juice for 2 pages? - Moz Q&A
Does "Canonical" tag pass link juice? Which URL should we prefer for link building? - Google Webmaster forum

Hope it helps.
Best luck.
GR.

[KristinaKledzik]

Canonicals can pass link juice (see Dr. Pete's comment here), but it's at Google's discretion. I've seen it go both ways.

The best way is to only link the one version you've chosen as the canonical. I'm not familiar with Magento - is that something that you can change easily? I think it'd be worth the time you'd invest in making that change.