Martin Splitt

★★★ Does Google Really Need All JavaScript Features to Work for Proper Rendering?

Martin Splitt explained on Twitter that for Google's rendering phase of your web pages to work well, it's not necessary for all features to be active as they would be for an end user, such as the burg...

Sep 06, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Should You Really Optimize Your Image ALT Attributes to Improve Your SEO?

Martin Splitt confirmed on Twitter that the ALT attribute of image tags (no, we don't say "ALT tag" 🙂) carries weight in SEO and that this information should therefore be included in IMG tags for imag...

Aug 16, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Does Google really ignore web workers in its rendering process?

Web workers are executed and registered by Google, but the rendering system does not properly wait for events occurring in their separate environment. If a web worker makes a network request, Google d...

Jul 29, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ How do Promises and WebAssembly impact SEO rendering?

Promises and WebAssembly work effectively for Google rendering as long as they execute on the main thread. Google waits for the main thread's task queue to be empty, and promises add elements to it....

Jul 29, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Why do so many landing pages contain incorrect links?

According to data from the Web Almanac 2019-2020, 12% of the analyzed landing pages contained links that were not appropriate HTML links, indicating that even basic issues remain widespread....

Jun 17, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Is it true that PageSpeed Insights and Lighthouse aren’t essential for user experience?

Google confirms that PageSpeed Insights and Lighthouse are not used to measure or evaluate pages as part of the Page Experience update. These tools are helpful but are not used in ranking....

Jun 17, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ How does Google really interpret JavaScript generated content?

Google treats JavaScript generated content in the same manner as static HTML content. The content is first extracted from the crawled HTML, and then populated after the page has been rendered. There i...

May 27, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ How does Google enhance link discovery through dual extraction?

Google extracts links in two phases: immediately during the HTML crawl, and then again after the page has rendered. This approach allows for link discovery as early as possible in the indexing process...

May 27, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Is hidden content truly visible to Google?

If the full content is present in the HTML and is visible in the rendered HTML (even if it's hidden behind a client-side 'Read more' button in JavaScript), Google can see and index it. This is not an ...

May 26, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Do Google’s third-party tools really impact your SEO?

Google Search treats all third-party tools as third parties, including Google Analytics, Google Ads, reCAPTCHA, and Tag Manager. They do not receive any special treatment and can impact performance ju...

May 26, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Why Have #! Fragments Become a No-Go for SEO?

Using fragments (hash bang, #!) to load different content is no longer a recommended strategy and hasn’t been for several years. This can lead to problems with discovery and canonical selection....

May 26, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Does JavaScript Really Affect Crawlability?

JavaScript generally has no impact on crawlability. The blocking of the main thread by JavaScript is a loading performance issue, not a crawling issue. Crawling and rendering are two distinct steps....

May 26, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Why does Google render after crawling?

During crawling, Google only downloads the HTML. JavaScript resources are not downloaded at this stage. Later, during rendering, Google loads the page like a browser, downloads CSS, JavaScript, and ma...

May 26, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ How Are JavaScript Resource Requests Impacting Your Crawl Budget?

Requests to load JavaScript resources during rendering count against the crawl budget. This can slow down the crawling of very large sites (millions of pages or more), but it does not affect crawlabil...

May 26, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Does blocking the main thread really impact SEO?

The fact that JavaScript blocks the main thread is not a problem for Google's rendering. However, it impacts real user experience by making the site unresponsive, which in turn affects page speed, a r...

May 26, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Could JavaScript harm your SEO the way Flash did?

JavaScript is an integral part of the web that brings interactivity, unlike Flash, which was a separate black box. JavaScript is not bad in itself but becomes problematic when misused or overused....

May 26, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Is it possible to avoid cloaking with localized user experiences?

Creating a different user experience based on geolocation is not deemed cloaking, provided the thematic content remains generally the same. Cloaking only occurs if the content shown to Google is compl...

May 26, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Could using URL fragments for JavaScript modals actually boost your SEO?

To display contextual content in JavaScript modals, it is advisable to use URL fragments (#) because Google generally ignores them. Fragments identify content that is already part of the main page....

May 26, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★ Why should you steer clear of inline JavaScript for large SEO scripts?

You should not inline large amounts of JavaScript because it prevents caching. External JavaScript files can be cached and are only downloaded occasionally, unlike inline code which must be downloaded...

May 26, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available

★★★ Is it true that the canonical tag is often overlooked by Google?

The canonical tag is a signal or suggestion, not a directive. Google may choose a different canonical than the one specified because many people misuse it, and Google cannot trust a systematically cor...

May 26, 2021 ⚡ Analysis available