Pagination
Properly handling paginated content (blog archives, category pages) helps search engines understand the relationship between paginated pages and prevents duplicate content issues.
Prerequisites
- WordPress admin access
- Paginated archive or category pages
Step-by-Step Guide
Understand Pagination Options
Option 1: Self-referencing canonicals on each page (most common)
Option 2: All pages canonical to page 1 (not recommended usually)
Option 3: View all page with canonical (good for short lists)
Yoast SEO handles this automatically with Option 1
Verify Current Pagination Setup
Navigate to page 2 of any archive (e.g., /blog/page/2/)
View page source
Check the canonical tag
Should point to itself: /blog/page/2/
Check for prev/next links (deprecated by Google but harmless)
Consider Noindexing Paginated Archives
For some sites, page 2+ of archives add little SEO value
Go to Yoast SEO > Settings > Content Types
Consider subpages of archives settings
This is optional and depends on content strategy
Consider Infinite Scroll Implementation
Infinite scroll can hurt SEO if not implemented properly
Ensure each "page" has a unique URL accessible to crawlers
Use History API to update URL as user scrolls
Provide links in footer to paginated URLs
Verification Checklist
- Each paginated page has correct canonical
- Paginated pages are accessible to crawlers
- Internal links exist to paginated content
- Pagination does not create duplicate title issues
Pro Tips
- Google deprecated rel=prev/next but proper setup still helps
- Show more posts per page to reduce total paginated pages
- Ensure page 1 links back to earlier content (not orphaned)
- Keep paginated URLs clean without session parameters