Derek Buchanan

Member since 12/1/2023

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Reply to Hreflang Attribute when we have different sites for languages

Google Search Central•2/20/2024

Hi Sarath,

The URL you specify for the x-default fallback URL should be the same for all annotations in the hreflang cluster.

So for you, set this on all the domain versions:

rel="alternate" href="https://www.test.com" hreflang="x-default"

It doesn't matter if they are on different ccTLDs (just be consistent). It's a common mistake to assign the x-default to the same ccTLD URL version (that's where the canonical tag helps).

You were right from the beginning thinking to target all English speakers worldwide.

Hope that helps.

Reply to hreflang x-default best practice

Google Search Central•2/20/2024

Hi Ale,

Good article reference - there are a few folks I know that have pinged Google on clarification on that exact example.

As alluded to earlier, x-default is optional so it's not going to hurt you. And homepages have special treatment in these scenarios: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2014/05/creating-right-homepage-for-your

For your product pages tho, at this point I think the most important factor to consider is intent/ranking vs. branded/non-branded queries:

For non-branded queries (eg. green hoodie) for your products, G will likely not rank your x-default country selector page since it has no commercial intent.
For branded (eg. green hoodie your company), you have a better chance of G surfacing your country selector to a non-matching user profile (i.e. non-matching hreflangs).

Just my thoughts. Hope that helps a bit. I'll ping you if we get a definitive word on this.