Search
Pages declare their canonical address
seo.missing-canonical
Why this matters
A canonical tag tells Google which address is the real one for a page. Without it, the same page reachable with a tracking parameter or a trailing slash can be treated as several competing pages.
Who fixes it
You can, usually
Roughly how long
Minutes
Care needed
Low risk to change
How to fix it
Add a self-referencing canonical tag to every page.
On your platform
WordPress
Yoast, Rank Math and SEOPress all add a self-referencing canonical to every page automatically, so a missing one usually means no SEO plugin is installed rather than a setting being wrong. Installing one fixes this across the whole site at once.
Shopify
Shopify's themes print this from `{{ canonical_url }}` in `theme.liquid`, so a missing tag means that line has been removed from the head — check there first. Note that Shopify deliberately points a product reached through a collection back at the plain product address, which is correct rather than a fault.
Drupal
The Metatag module has a canonical URL setting. Set it once on the content type using the token for the node's own address and it applies everywhere.
Joomla
The usual cause on Joomla is one article reachable through more than one menu item, which gives a single page several addresses. Tidying the menu structure is the real fix; an SEO extension can add the tag meanwhile, and Joomla's SEF URL settings decide which address it points at.
How we score it
Failing this check takes up to 8 points off your search score. It is a fact about your site rather than a measurement, so it reads the same on every scan until you change something.
Does your site pass this one?
This check runs on every scan, along with the other 106. Free, no account, and you see the evidence for each result.
Check my siteOther search checks
- Canonical tags point somewhere validA canonical tag tells Google which address is the real one for a page. When it points somewhere wrong — another domain, a dead page, or the wrong protocol — Google follows it anyway, and the page you wanted indexed can be dropped in favour of one that does not exist.
- Content has been updated recentlySome content is meant to sit still, and age alone is not a fault. But prices, opening hours and staff pages that have not been touched in over a year are usually wrong by now — and a visitor who acts on the wrong opening hours does not come back to check whether the rest was right.
- Descriptions are a sensible lengthLong descriptions get truncated mid-sentence; very short ones waste the space you are given.
- Each page has exactly one title tagA page can only have one title. When there are several, the browser and Google each pick one — and they do not always pick the same one, so what you see in the tab may not be what appears in search.
- Each page has one main headingSeveral top-level headings makes the structure of the page ambiguous. Worth checking rather than urgent — modern HTML permits it, and Google handles it, but it usually signals that headings are being chosen for their size.
- Every page has a main headingThe h1 is the headline of the page. Without one, both visitors skimming and search engines parsing the page have nothing telling them what it is about.