Google’s Martin Splitt answered a query about how Googlebot responds to a pre-render meta tag that has the worth of 404 web page not discovered. It’s a superb query as a result of that is the type of meta tag, a non-standard meta ingredient, isn’t typically encountered so it’s good to know what to do when one thing like this comes up.
The particular person asking the query needed to learn about how Google may reply to a meta tag within the head part that has the title “prerender-status-code” and a price of “404” which implies that the requested web page is just not discovered.
The query was requested by an individual named Martin and Martin Splitt of Google is the one who answered it.
That is the query :
“Martin is asking: What does Googlebot do when it finds <meta title=”prerender-status-code” content material=”404″> ?”
Martin Splitt answered:
“Properly Martin, that’s straightforward to say, Googlebot presently ignores that standing code.
I assume that is coming from a single web page utility that’s client-side rendered and also you wish to keep away from soft-404s, in that case take into account including <meta title=”robots” content material=”noindex”> or redirect to a web page the place the server responds with the 404 standing code.
For extra data on that see our documentation at builders.google.com/search.”
What’s Prerender-Standing-Code?
The prerender-status-code meta ingredient (generally known as meta tag) is just not an official meta tag and there’s no documentation on it on the Worldwide Internet Consortium (W3C.org), the place the official HTML requirements are created.
That is extra of a proprietary or non-standard meta ingredient. Non-standard meta components are aren’t a part of the official W3C HTML specs. Some non-standard meta components are browser-specific or are created for particular functions. Consequently, they will not be supported by completely different browsers or by search engines like google. and their conduct will not be constant throughout completely different browsers
The prerender-status-code meta ingredient is an instance of a non-standard meta ingredient that additionally occurs to not be supported by Google.
One other non-standard meta ingredient that’s not supported by Google is the meta key phrases ingredient. There isn’t any reference to it on the W3C.org and it was by no means part of the official HTML requirements. It was a meta ingredient that was invented by search engines like google within the Nineteen Nineties.
The X-UA-Suitable meta ingredient is an instance of a browser-specific non-standard meta ingredient that’s an outdated meta ingredient that was particular to the outdated Web Explorer internet browser.
That is an instance of the X-UA-Suitable meta ingredient:
<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Suitable" content material="IE=edge">
The takeaway from Martin’s reply concerning the prerender-status-code meta ingredient is that many non-standard meta components aren’t supported by Google.
One other takeaway is that not each meta tag is part of the official HTML requirements which might be discovered on the World Vast Internet Consortium web site (W3C.org). These non-official meta components are referred to as non-standard meta components.
Extra data might be discovered at Google’s assist web page about supported meta tags, which was final up to date on December 1, 2023.
Meta tags and attributes that Google helps
Hearken to the Google Workplace hours video on the 3:46 minute mark:
Featured Picture by Shutterstock/Jaaak
