Wikipedia:Controlling search engine indexing

There are a variety of ways in which Wikipedia attempts to control search engine indexing, commonly termed "noindexing" on Wikipedia. The default behavior is that articles older than 90 days are indexed. All of the methods rely on using the noindex HTML meta tag, which tells search engines not to index certain pages. Respecting the tag, especially in terms of removing already indexed content, is up to the individual search engine, and in theory the tag may be ignored entirely.

The control methods are:
 * 1) Controlling an entire namespace, via MediaWiki software settings
 * 2) Controlling classes of pages, via MediaWiki:Robots.txt (Wikipedia's Robots.txt file)
 * 3) Controlling individual pages by adding the   magic word into them, either directly or using the NOINDEX template, however articles are a special case, see.
 * 4) Controlling multiple pages by adding the   magic word into standard templates used in certain situations (same caveat as in the third point).

Indexing of articles ("mainspace")
Articles older than 90 days are automatically indexed. The  magic word and the NOINDEX template do not work on them. Articles younger than 90 days are not indexed, unless they have been patrolled and do not have the  magic word or the NOINDEX template on them (or a template that transcludes the NOINDEX template, such as the speedy deletion templates). Note that &action=info will incorrectly state that they are indexed. Articles that include the NOINDEX template are listed at Category:Noindexed articles.

This patrolling may be done automatically by the software, as in the case of articles created by editors with the autopatrolled user right, or by another editor with the new page reviewer user right (not to be confused with the pending changes reviewer user right).

Namespace control
On English Wikipedia the entire namespace, ,   and   namespaces are automatically noindexed via a software setting.

At the same time,  and   are disabled, in addition to article space, on the Draft namespace, and the Draft talk namespace; they have no effect there.

Robots.txt noindexing
MediaWiki:Robots.txt forbids analytic tools from visiting sensitive or potentially sensitive types of pages, primarily in the Wikipedia namespace – for example deletion debates. A side effect of not visiting is normally that a page cannot be indexed. Where possible, you should in addition use  for those pages.

Individual pages
Individual pages can be noindexed by adding the  magic word into that page, either directly or using the NOINDEX template. As explained above, this magic word doesn't work in mainspace (on articles).

Pages with the keyword are listed in Category:Noindexed pages.

Standard template noindexing
Some standard templates include the  keyword, thereby noindexing pages to which the templates are applied. Such templates should be listed in Category:Wikipedia templates which apply NOINDEX.

Biographies of Living Persons talkpage noindexing
The templates BLP and BLP others include the NOINDEX parameter. The BLP template is added automatically by the WikiProject Biography talkpage template, if given the parameter ; see the documentation of that template for more details. Pages using these templates are automatically categorised in Category:Biography articles of living people.

Other templates
These templates include NOINDEX: See also Category:Wikipedia templates which apply NOINDEX.
 * User sandbox, Userspace draft
 * Sockpuppet, Sockpuppeteer, Banned user, and others
 * Db-meta and Deletable file, plus the various speedy deletion templates built on it
 * Prod blp
 * Uw-userspacenoindex provides a user warning message for inappropriate use of userspace which required noindexing.

Individual pages
Individual pages can override namespace noindexing by adding the  magic word into that page, either directly or using the INDEX template. Such pages appear in Category:Indexed pages. However, INDEX does not override noindexing via MediaWiki:Robots.txt. As explained above, this magic word doesn't work in mainspace (on articles).

The ability to add the INDEX magic word to user spaces (User:, User talk:) has been restricted by an edit filter to extended confirmed users following a community discussion.

Nofollow HTML attribute
Since 2007, all links to other websites from English Wikipedia have the nofollow HTML attribute set. This means that on pages that are indexed by search engines, any links found by a search engine on those pages should not influence the link target's ranking in the search engine's index.

Namespace discussions

 * Requests for comment/User page indexing (2009 proposal)
 * Search engine indexing – 2009 proposal to change the namespace settings for indexing
 * Wikipedia:NOINDEX of noticeboards – Dead/moot proposal to NOINDEX noticeboards (2008)
 * Village pump (proposals)/Archive 35 – 2008 proposal to noindex several obscure namespaces like "Image talk." Strong majority opposed.
 * Village pump (proposals)/Archive 36 – Proposal to re-index user talk pages. Majority opposed.
 * Village pump (policy)/Archive 59 – Mixed discussion to exclude all non-content namespaces from indexing.
 * Village pump (policy)/Archive 62 – Proposal to exclude certain pages from indexing.
 * Talk pages not indexed by Google – A proposal to tell Google not to index the Talk: namespace.
 * Requests for comment/NOINDEX – Proposal to NOINDEX unpatrolled new articles and articles with specific deletion templates.
 * Village pump (proposals)/Archive 126 Noindexed userspace by default
 * Village_pump (proposals)/Archive 173 – resulted in no consensus

Individual template discussions

 * Template talk:Non-free media – Proposal to NOINDEX non-free images. No consensus.
 * Template talk:WikiProject Biography/Archive 5 – Proposal to NOINDEX BLP talk page template
 * Template talk:Administrators' noticeboard navbox all – NOINDEX on AN archives template