When I audit my Shopify using Markets site through SEM rush I am seeing the error - hreflang conflicts within page source code (full error below). This seems to be on every page, and I am at a loss as to what is wrong! Would really appreciate any input from the community! Thanks in advance!
One of the pages it cites as an error is https://domain.com/en-us/collections/collection-name/products/product-name (not real URL - obvs! but its the same structure).
On this page it has a canonical tag set up to its UK counterpart page which is being picked up:
And the Shopify generated hreflang tags are outputting as follows:
FULL SEM RUSH error -
About this issue: If you’re running a multilingual website, it is necessary to help users from other
countries ?nd your content in the language that is most appropriate for them. This is where the
hre?ang (rel=“alternate” hre?ang=“x”) attribute comes in handy. This attribute helps search
engines understand which page should be shown to visitors based on their location.
It is very important to properly synchronize your hre?ang attributes within your page’s source
code, otherwise you may experience unexpected search engine behavior. For more information,
see this article https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/189077?hl=en. How to ?x: To
avoid any con?icts, we recommend that you review your hre?ang attributes within your page’s
source code and ?x any of the following issues: 1.
Con?icting hre?ang and rel=canonical URLs. 2. Con?icting hre?ang URLs.
- No self-referencing hre?ang URLs.
I think in default href lang, one should not use “alternate”
Congrats on being the one to get my 1000th post 
That is a pretty unhelpful error message. The options to “resolve” the error are broad.
It is not possible to help you without knowing the actual page. Why? Hreflang tag errors are not isolated to a list of code one page. How another page links to that page through the hreflang tag affects such errors.
Furthermore, you need to see the rel canonical tag on the page since it’s best practice that it matches up to the page’s hreflang tag.
My favourite tool for hreflang tag analysis is Screaming Frog since I’ve noticed some tools make errors for things that are actually against Google’s best practices. Furthermore, for you, it’s probably a good idea to use, if you’re not going to share any pages here, as it’s another tool to actually get the specific tag issue.
I have the most comprehensive guide on hreflang tags in Shopify that will be of help to you: https://www.digitaldarts.com.au/hreflang-tags-shopify
Hey Josh! Thanks for the reply, and congrats on the 1000th post - I feel honoured! Appreciate your suggestions and will run another report on that tool.
Hi @Josh_Uebergang ,
I am having the same issue as @dlincoln . Basically, 2128 (!) erros (Hreflang conflicts within page source code) in 3365 crawled pages.
I have a multilingual website (English, Spanish, French and German): https://vengastore.com
I am using the Dawn theme and let’s take as an example this page in my website: https://vengastore.com/collections/burning-man/products/amsterdam
Sem Rush report gives me:
And the recommendation is the one mentioned by @dlincoln :
This is where the hreflang (rel=“alternate” hre?ang=“x”) attribute comes in handy. This attribute helps search engines understand which page should be shown to visitors based on their location.
My question is (sorry if it is a silly question), shall I add the rel=“alternate” hre?ang=“x” somewhere? Doesn’t the Shopify template handle it?
Thanks for your help!
I have found SEMRush to be very questionable in their reports on hreflang issues. Generally, it’s right, but I’ve seen plenty of instances where their advice is flat out wrong.
I’d presume that was a typo error as “x” is wrong. The correct markup is <link rel=“alternate” hreflang=“x-default”…
Your store has this:
No one can help you without knowing what errors on what pages. To help you self-fix it, I strongly suggest you read my guide mentioned earlier. It is the most comprehensive on the topic. I also released a hreflang checker Chrome extension just recently.
