How to Check if an External Link is Nofollowed?

WhenBuild your own websiteWhen learning about SEO, you must have heard about building backlinks, but building backlinks involves an option called nofollow. External links with the nofollow attribute, even if created, have little effect on website SEO optimization because they prevent the transfer of link equity (PageRank). So, how do we check if a link is nofollow?

What is a Nofollow Link?

A Nofollow link refers to a hyperlink in the code that has the rel="nofollow" tag. Nofollow tells search engines "do not follow this link." Simply put, if you post a link on a website and that link has the nofollow attribute, you won"t receive a "vote" from that website, and it won"t increase your website"s SEO weight (PageRank). For a detailed introduction, you can refer to the Baidu Baike entry:https://baike.baidu.com/item/Nofollow/2410595?fr=aladdin

How to Determine if a Link has Nofollow?

Simple example,What kind of link is called a nofollow link?: A link format without nofollow, which passes search weight (PageRank).

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A link format with nofollow, which does not pass search weight (PageRank).

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How to check if a link is nofollow?The simplest method is to use the inspect function in the Chrome browser, as demonstrated in the image below.

1. Right-click on the link you want to check and click 'Inspect';
2. Check if the link's rel attribute contains 'nofollow'.If it contains 'nofollow', it means the link has the nofollow attribute.
3. In the demonstration above, the link to '闪电博' (Shandianbo) does not have nofollow, while the link for '备案' (ICP filing) has nofollow.

The noopener noreferrer attribute added to links in the demo is a vulnerability fix for the _blank new window opening attribute. The general idea is that if external site links open in a new window, not adding noopener noreferrer may pose a phishing risk. Specific details can be found online. By default, when publishing a post in WordPress, if you set it to open in a new window, this attribute will also be automatically added.

Does a Nofollow Link Affect SEO?

Most SEO resources online indicate that links with Nofollow do not help with SEO because they tell search engines not to follow them. However, if you can leave your link in a visible place on a large website, it can still benefit your site indirectly, at least by providing exposure. More information can be researched independently. Typically, you can add nofollow to irrelevant links on your website, such as for the ICP filing number, advertisement links, etc.