hreflang Checker

How to Check hreflang Tags

Enter the address of one language version and run the check; the verdicts and the list of annotations appear below the form.

1. Paste the full URL of the page, including https://.
2. Tick "Check the return links" to fetch the alternate pages as well, or leave it off for a faster check of this page only.
3. Select Submit and wait for the page, and any alternates, to be fetched.
4. Read the verdicts of the hreflang rules, then the list of annotations with the notes on each one.
5. Fix the flagged annotations on your site and run the hreflang check again.

What the hreflang Check Reports

The result shows how many annotations the page declares, where they are declared, and whether each one passes the checks below.

hreflang Annotations Found

Every annotation is listed with its code, its resolved URL and its source: the HTML <link rel="alternate" hreflang> tag or the HTTP Link header. The audit rules read the HTML annotations, as a full audit does; annotations in the header are listed and checked by this tool.

Language and Region Codes

The tool checks the shape of each code: x-default, or a two-letter language, an optional four-letter script and an optional two-letter region, separated by hyphens, such as en, en-GB or zh-Hant-TW. Values such as en_US, eng or es-419 fail the rule hreflang.invalid_code. It does not check membership of the ISO 639-1 and ISO 3166-1 lists, so en-UK passes although the region code should be GB.

hreflang Self-Reference

Each language version must list itself as well as the other versions. The check passes when one annotation points to the page's final URL or to its canonical URL.

hreflang x-default

The x-default value names the page for visitors whose language settings match none of your versions, often a language selector. The checker shows its URL when it is declared and reports it as not declared otherwise, without a failure.

hreflang Return Tags

With the option on, each distinct alternate URL is fetched once, up to the limit shown under the option, and its own annotations are searched for a link back to this page. Each alternate is marked as linking back, not linking back, unreachable or not checked.

hreflang Tags With Errors

Most hreflang errors are a wrong code, a URL that is not fully qualified, or an alternate page that does not link back.

Invalid Language and Region Codes

An underscore instead of a hyphen, a three-letter language or a country name in place of a code breaks the format and makes the annotation unusable. The checker lists every value with a broken format; it does not look codes up in the ISO lists, so confirm by hand that a code such as en-UK is written en-GB.

Alternate URLs That Are Not Fully Qualified

Google asks for alternate URLs that include the scheme and host, such as https://example.com/fr/, not /fr/ or //example.com/fr/. The checker resolves relative values so you can see where they point, and marks them so you can write them in full.

How to Fix hreflang Tags With Errors

Correct the code or the URL in the template that writes the annotations, so every language version gets the same set. Then make sure each alternate lists this page back, run the checker with the return links on, and confirm that every alternate is marked as linking back.

hreflang Checker Questions