Do I need to add canonical tag to product pages?

[ac80]

Hey! I sell dog leads (8 colours), collars (8 colours) and sets (7 colours). Each colour has it's own product page without variation picker. I use suggested products at the bottom of each page to show the other colours. The text and key words are the same on every page. Do I need to add canonical tag to each page or is this something Shopify does automatically? Thanks

[Moira · Accepted solution]

Hey @ac80,

Thanks for reaching out!

Canonical tags play a crucial role in managing duplicate content on your website. They help search engines understand which version of a page should be considered the primary one. In your case, since each colour variation has its own product page, it’s essential to handle this properly.

Here’s the good news: Shopify automatically adds canonical tags to product pages, collections, and blog posts. These tags point to the original version of the content, which helps prevent basic duplicate content issues. So, you don’t need to manually add canonical tags for each colour variation page. When you use Shopify themes, they are built with Google-friendly canonical URLs. This means that even though the content might appear similar across different colour pages, the canonical URL ensures that duplicate content won’t be indexed by Google. Essentially, Shopify takes care of this for you!

However, if you encounter more complex duplicate content scenarios (such as pagination or filters causing issues), you might need to customize or add canonical tags to specific pages. In such cases, you can seek assistance from Shopify experts or explore custom solutions.