Nofollow Link

A link with rel="nofollow" attribute that traditionally signals to search engines not to pass link equity.

The rel="nofollow" attribute was introduced by Google in 2005 to combat comment spam. It signals that the linking page does not want to vouch for the linked URL. Traditionally, nofollow links passed no PageRank. In 2019, Google changed nofollow to a "hint" rather than a directive — Google may choose to follow and count nofollow links, but generally they pass less or no equity.

In 2019, Google also introduced two new rel values: rel="ugc" (user-generated content, like forum posts and comments) and rel="sponsored" (paid links, including affiliate links). Sites should use these in appropriate contexts. Paid links without rel="sponsored" or nofollow violate Google's link spam policies.

Nofollow links still have SEO value beyond equity: they drive traffic, increase brand visibility, can lead to natural dofollow links, and a natural backlink profile includes a mix of dofollow and nofollow links. A profile with 100% dofollow links looks unnatural.