Handling Filtering and Sorting Without Canonicals

Do Filtering and Sorting Pages Have No Canonicals or Self-Referencing Canonicals?

When it comes to eCommerce SEO, especially on platforms like Shopify and WooCommerce, handling filtering and sorting pages correctly is crucial to avoid duplicate content issues. Let’s explore how to manage canonicals for these pages on both platforms.

Shopify

In Shopify, filtering and sorting pages often generate URLs with query parameters. By default, Shopify does not add canonical tags to these pages, which can lead to duplicate content issues. To address this, you can add self-referencing canonical tags to these pages.

This code should be added to your theme’s theme.liquid file within the section. The {{ canonical_url }} variable ensures that the canonical URL points to the current page, thus preventing duplicate content issues.

WooCommerce

In WooCommerce, filtering and sorting pages also generate URLs with query parameters. By default, WooCommerce does not add canonical tags to these pages either. To add self-referencing canonical tags, you can use the following code snippet in your theme’s functions.php file:

add_action('wp_head', 'add_self_referencing_canonical');
function add_self_referencing_canonical() {
  if (is_product_category() || is_shop()) {
    echo '';
  }
}

This code checks if the current page is a product category or shop page and then adds a self-referencing canonical tag to it.

By implementing these changes, you can ensure that filtering and sorting pages on both Shopify and WooCommerce have self-referencing canonical tags, helping to prevent duplicate content issues and improve your site’s SEO.