How to check hreflang on a Shopify store
hreflang tags tell search engines which language or regional version of a page to show. On Shopify, they're added for you when you publish languages or set up market domains or subfolders, but it's worth checking they look right.
Where to look
Open a product page, view the page source, and search for hreflang. You should see one <link rel="alternate" hreflang="…"> line per published language or market URL.
The 4 things to check
- Self-reference: each page lists itself among its alternates.
- Return links: if the English page points to the French page, the French page points back. One-way links are ignored by Google.
- x-default: a fallback for visitors who don't match any listed language or region.
- Canonical agrees: each language version's canonical tag points to itself, not to the primary-language page. A canonical pointing elsewhere tells Google to ignore that version.
Common Shopify causes of problems
- A language is published but most content isn't translated, so translated URLs show the same English text.
- Theme code or an app adds its own hreflang or canonical tags on top of Shopify's.
- Market domains are set up but not all are linked to the right languages.
Reference: Google Search Central, "Tell Google about localized versions of your page".
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