Faceted Navigation

Why It Matters

Faceted navigation improves user experience but can create thousands of duplicate or low-value URLs that waste crawl budget and dilute page authority. Proper implementation is critical - poorly managed faceted navigation is a top cause of technical SEO issues on e-commerce sites.

How It Works

Users select filters (e.g., 'Red' + 'Size 10' + 'Under $100') creating unique URLs for each combination. This can generate millions of URL variations, many with identical or thin content. Search engines may crawl these URLs inefficiently, index duplicate content, and struggle to determine the canonical version.

Use Cases

• A clothing site allows filtering by size, color, brand, and price, creating 10,000+ possible URL combinations for 200 products
• An electronics store uses faceted nav for specifications but blocks low-value filter combinations from indexing
• A furniture site implements canonical tags on filtered pages pointing to the main category to consolidate authority

Best Practices

• Use robots.txt or noindex to block low-value filter combinations from indexing
• Implement canonical tags on filtered pages pointing to the main category URL
• Add rel='nofollow' to filter links to prevent crawlers from following them
• Allow indexing only for high-value, commonly searched filter combinations
• Use URL parameters handling in Google Search Console to guide crawling
• Monitor crawl stats to ensure filters aren't wasting crawl budget