Rel=prev/next and canonical tags on paginated pages?

[poiseo]

Hi there,

I'm using rel="prev" and rel="next" on paginated category pages. On 1st page I'm also setting a canonical tag, since that page happens to get hits to an URL with parameters.

The site also uses mobile version of pages on a subdomain.

Here's what markup the 1st desktop page has:

Here's what markup the 2nd desktop page has:

Here's what markup the 1st MOBILE page has:

Here's what markup the 2nd MOBILE page has:

Questions:

1. On desktop pages starting from page 2 to page X, if these pages get traffic to their versions with parameters, will I'll have duplicate issues or the canonical tag on 1st page makes me safe?

2. Should I use canonical tags on mobile pages starting from page 2 to page X?

Are there any better solutions of avoiding duplicate content issues?

[GPainter]

First off you might find this page handy - http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.co.uk/2011/09/pagination-with-relnext-and-relprev.html

Canonical and pagination are the same (sort of) so you don't need both.

Canonical is when you've got a few pages that are the same and you're telling Google these are all the same but here is the original.

Pagination is telling Google these pages are all the same but they are in a sequence here is the first and here is the last page

Now there is no harm having both on a page especially if you've got some parameters,  You should be safe plus duplicate content is not the worst thing to face and it's not going to cause that much harm if you've got a couple of pages duplicated.

Hope that helps.

[poiseo]

Thanks for your answer, but I didn't say that this is for a few pages. What if there are 100k pages like these?

If I put both rel="prev"/rel="next" and canonical tags on them all. Will it be fine? What URLs do I put inside of canonical tags on pages other than the 1st page of the pagination?

[GPainter]

It shouldn't matter how many pages though it might be beneficial to categorize them or similar to help users but you can canonical the first page or you can canonical a page that's the same or very similar.

There are many helpful facts on the link above.

[poiseo]

There's another link: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2013/04/5-common-mistakes-with-relcanonical.html

It says:

In cases of paginated content, we recommend either a rel=canonical from component pages to a single-page version of the article, or to use rel=”prev” and rel=”next” pagination markup. If rel=canonical to a view-all page isn’t designated, paginated content can use rel=”prev” and rel=”next” markup.

That's why i'm confused which way to go with...

[GPainter]

Okay, technically you should have a "view all" page and canonical to that which is what that is referring to, as you've got so many pages it is still possible to do that but may suffer from load times etc. So if you were to do it by the book you would ahve the rel=prev/next etc. and a view all button which lists all the content you would then canonical to that.

[poiseo]

Yes, but having a "view all" page is not possible. It will be too big to generate it, cache it and display it...

[GPainter]

Yes, which is why I thought the first page might be a bit more helpful as a reference point.