Crawlable links

Day 1: Crawling 1

Said on stage 1

Day 2: Indexing 34

Shown on screen 11

Said on stage 14

What Google's documentation says 3

Analysis by the author 6

Day 3: Serving: Ranking, Search Console, and Performance 3

Shown on screen 1

Said on stage 1

Analysis by the author 1

Across days and sessions 18

1. Stage D2-C038 Day 2 · How is HTML interpreted

   Google uses the links it extracts for three purposes: discovering new pages, determining a site's structure, and ranking.

   extends
   Slide D1-C040 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   URL discovery works through links: a homepage links to section pages, which link to further pages.

2. Slide D2-C168 Day 2 · Lightning session D: Rendering and JavaScript

   In Google's processing step, links are extracted from the HTML Google already has, before rendering, and the URLs found go back to the crawl queue.

   extends
   Slide D1-C040 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   URL discovery works through links: a homepage links to section pages, which link to further pages.

3. Slide D2-C168 Day 2 · Lightning session D: Rendering and JavaScript

   In Google's processing step, links are extracted from the HTML Google already has, before rendering, and the URLs found go back to the crawl queue.

   extends
   Slide D2-C048 Day 2 · How is HTML interpreted

   Links extracted during processing are sent back to the crawl queue, where scheduling starts again for the newly found URLs.

4. Docs D2-C169 Day 2 · Lightning session D: Rendering and JavaScript

   Google's JavaScript SEO basics guide says Googlebot extracts links twice, from the HTML response before rendering and again from the rendered HTML, so links injected with JavaScript can be found if they use crawlable <a href> markup.

   extends
   Slide D1-C040 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   URL discovery works through links: a homepage links to section pages, which link to further pages.

5. Slide D2-C184 Day 2 · Lightning session D: Rendering and JavaScript

   Google follows links in <a href> elements; a link that only runs an onclick handler, or a hash pseudo-link such as href=#/products, may be invisible to Google.

   extends
   Docs D1-C115 Day 1 · session not recorded

   Google's crawlers do not click buttons. Each page in a series needs its own URL and an <a href> link to the next page, should not use page 1 as its canonical, and rel=next and rel=prev are no longer used.

6. Slide D2-C184 Day 2 · Lightning session D: Rendering and JavaScript

   Google follows links in <a href> elements; a link that only runs an onclick handler, or a hash pseudo-link such as href=#/products, may be invisible to Google.

   extends
   Slide D2-C040 Day 2 · How is HTML interpreted

   Google cannot extract a link from an a element that only has an onclick handler, because Googlebot does not click, so the JavaScript is never triggered.

7. Slide D2-C187 Day 2 · Lightning session D: Rendering and JavaScript

   A market or language selector built as a button works for users but leaves the whole cluster of alternate-language pages without crawlable links, so the cluster is orphaned for Google.

   extends
   Docs D1-C115 Day 1 · session not recorded

   Google's crawlers do not click buttons. Each page in a series needs its own URL and an <a href> link to the next page, should not use page 1 as its canonical, and rel=next and rel=prev are no longer used.

8. Analysis D2-C188 Day 2 · Lightning session D: Rendering and JavaScript

   Hash-fragment links are a problem only where Google should follow them: product, category and language links need a real URL in an <a href>, while fragments can deliberately keep filter combinations out of the crawl, as Google's faceted navigation guide allows.

   extends
   Docs D1-C101 Day 1 · How Google thinks about crawl budget

   Google's faceted navigation guide prefers prevention: disallow filter URLs in robots.txt and keep crawlable only item pages plus one unfiltered listing page, or use URL fragments, which Google generally does not crawl. rel=canonical and nofollow are weaker, slower options.

9. Analysis D2-C189 Day 2 · Lightning session D: Rendering and JavaScript

   Build market and language selectors as plain <a href> links to each alternate URL, not buttons or script handlers; otherwise the language versions have no internal links and depend on sitemaps to be found, which is slow.

   extends
   Analysis D1-C067 Day 1 · How crawling works

   A page with no internal links depends on sitemaps alone to be found, so it is discovered slowly and attracts little crawl demand.

10. Stage D2-C271 Day 2 · What is Google friendly JavaScript

    Google does not scroll a page when it renders it for indexing, so content that infinite scroll loads on scroll-depth triggers works for users but is never loaded for Google.

    extends
    Stage D1-C491 Day 1 · Q&A

    If paginated pages are replaced by a load-more button or infinite scroll without crawlable links to them, Google will not see the further pages at all.

11. Docs D2-C276 Day 2 · What is Google friendly JavaScript

    To make infinite scroll indexable, Google's lazy-loading guide says to support paginated loading: give each chunk its own persistent, unique URL, link sequentially to those URLs, and update the displayed URL with the History API when a new chunk becomes the main visible element.

    extends
    Docs D1-C115 Day 1 · session not recorded

    Google's crawlers do not click buttons. Each page in a series needs its own URL and an <a href> link to the next page, should not use page 1 as its canonical, and rel=next and rel=prev are no longer used.

12. Stage D2-C287 Day 2 · What is Google friendly JavaScript

    A link that is an <a> element but does not point to a real URL gives Google something to look at, but Google will not know where the link goes.

    extends
    Slide D1-C040 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    URL discovery works through links: a homepage links to section pages, which link to further pages.

13. Stage D2-C287 Day 2 · What is Google friendly JavaScript

    A link that is an <a> element but does not point to a real URL gives Google something to look at, but Google will not know where the link goes.

    extends
    Slide D2-C040 Day 2 · How is HTML interpreted

    Google cannot extract a link from an a element that only has an onclick handler, because Googlebot does not click, so the JavaScript is never triggered.

14. Stage D2-C288 Day 2 · What is Google friendly JavaScript

    With the History API, a single-page app can use real links and attach event listeners that intercept the click, rewrite the URL with pushState and load the new content, so Google can follow the links while users avoid full page reloads.

    extends
    Slide D2-C185 Day 2 · Lightning session D: Rendering and JavaScript

    The crawlable pattern for single-page app navigation is a real URL in the href, such as <a href=/products>, combined with History API routing (window.history.pushState) instead of hash routes.

15. Stage D2-C884 Day 2 · Lightning session E: Managing Duplicates and Site Moves

    The technical steps of a community speaker's domain consolidation included submitting new sitemaps, filing a change of address in Search Console and updating internal links so the new pages did not rely on redirects alone.

    extends
    Stage D1-C540 Day 1 · Q&A

    Asked how to plan a migration that does not leave many URLs unindexed, a Google panelist said the answer is probably not sitemaps: decide what matters from the business's perspective (for example whether to consolidate languages); listing the new URLs in a sitemap is probably a good idea and cannot hurt, but it is not the main tool.

16. Slide D2-C040 Day 2 · How is HTML interpreted

    Google cannot extract a link from an a element that only has an onclick handler, because Googlebot does not click, so the JavaScript is never triggered.

    repeats
    Docs D1-C115 Day 1 · session not recorded

    Google's crawlers do not click buttons. Each page in a series needs its own URL and an <a href> link to the next page, should not use page 1 as its canonical, and rel=next and rel=prev are no longer used.

17. Slide D2-C284 Day 2 · What is Google friendly JavaScript

    URL fragments (#) are often ignored by crawlers: a fragment exists only in the browser, so Google cannot request it.

    repeats
    Docs D1-C101 Day 1 · How Google thinks about crawl budget

    Google's faceted navigation guide prefers prevention: disallow filter URLs in robots.txt and keep crawlable only item pages plus one unfiltered listing page, or use URL fragments, which Google generally does not crawl. rel=canonical and nofollow are weaker, slower options.

18. Slide D2-C285 Day 2 · What is Google friendly JavaScript

    Google recommends the History API to give single-page apps clean URLs instead of fragment-based routes.

    repeats
    Slide D2-C185 Day 2 · Lightning session D: Rendering and JavaScript

    The crawlable pattern for single-page app navigation is a real URL in the href, such as <a href=/products>, combined with History API routing (window.history.pushState) instead of hash routes.

Built on these claims 7

Developer requirements 7

• MustDocumentedDEV-URL-01

  Make every navigational link an <a> element whose href holds a real URL

  Rests on 6 claims, 6 of them in this topic

• AvoidDocumentedDEV-URL-02

  Do not navigate with onclick handlers, javascript: URLs, routerLink without href or # pseudo-links

  Rests on 6 claims, 6 of them in this topic

• MustDocumentedDEV-URL-03

  Route single-page apps with the History API and real paths, not # fragments

  Rests on 6 claims, 6 of them in this topic

• MustDocumentedDEV-INT-06

  Build language and market selectors as <a href> links to each alternate URL

  Rests on 2 claims, 2 of them in this topic

• MustDocumentedDEV-URL-07

  Back infinite scroll and load-more buttons with paginated URLs

  Rests on 6 claims, 2 of them in this topic

• ShouldDocumentedDEV-CAN-09

  Keep migration redirects in place long term and judge a move in Search Console, not with site: queries

  Rests on 14 claims, 1 of them in this topic

• MustDocumentedDEV-URL-08

  Keep faceted navigation out of the crawl with robots.txt rules or URL fragments

  Rests on 12 claims, 1 of them in this topic

Sources 8

• Pagination, incremental page loading, and their impact on Google Search Google Search Central · checked 3 October 2026
• In-depth guide to how Google Search works Google Search Central · checked 3 October 2026
• meta tags and attributes that Google supports Google Search Central · checked 3 October 2026
• Link best practices for Google Google Search Central · checked 2 October 2026
• Understand the JavaScript SEO basics Google Search Central · checked 3 October 2026
• Fix lazy-loaded content Google Search Central · checked 2 October 2026
• Fix Search-related JavaScript problems Google Search Central · checked 2 October 2026
• How to move a site Google Search Central · checked 4 October 2026