Question 1

What is hreflang and when should I use it?

Accepted Answer

Hreflang is an HTML link attribute that tells Google which language and regional version of a page to serve to users in different countries or language preferences. Use it when you have the same (or similar) content in multiple languages (e.g. English and French), or when you target the same language to different regions (e.g. en-US and en-GB). Without hreflang, Google may show the wrong language version to international users, harming both rankings and conversion rates.

Question 2

Do hreflang tags need to be bidirectional?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Hreflang tags must be reciprocal — every page in the set must reference all the other pages in the set, including itself. If your English page references your French page but the French page does not reference the English page back, Google will ignore the hreflang signal entirely. Each page must also include a self-referencing hreflang tag pointing to itself. A missing or broken reciprocal link is the most common hreflang implementation error.

Hreflang Tag Generator

What gets checked