Has Rel Pagination is a yes/no check for whether a page carries at least one body link tag whose rel value is exactly next or prev. It returns 1 when either direction is present and 0 otherwise — presence alone does not prove the pagination is usable, indexable, or correctly sequenced.
| Factor ID | RG-LNK-003 |
|---|---|
| Family | Links on the page |
| Measurement | Boolean presence (0 / 1) |
| Measured zone | Link tags in the rendered page body |
What it measures
This factor indicates whether RankGear finds at least one body link tag whose rel value is exactly next or prev. It is a single presence signal — not a count and not a quality judgment. It reports only that pagination relationship metadata exists somewhere in the rendered body.
How RankGear measures it
RankGear parses link elements from the rendered body and compares each complete relationship value case-insensitively against next and prev. Either value returns 1. The check does not require both directions to be present, and it does not validate the linked sequence itself.
What RankGear looks for
<link rel="next" href="https://example.com/page/3/">
<link rel="prev" href="https://example.com/page/1/">| Value | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 1 | At least one body link tag has a rel of exactly next or prev — either direction counts. |
| 0 | No body link tag carries a next or prev relationship. |
How to optimize it
Treat this as an observation about your markup, not a target to chase. For genuinely paginated content, provide stable page URLs, clear crawlable next and previous navigation, self-consistent canonicals, and sensible indexing behavior. Add relationship metadata only when it accurately describes the sequence and is useful to supported systems — bolting rel-next/prev onto non-paginated pages earns nothing.
Important considerations
- One direction is enough to score 1 — the check does not require both next and prev.
- Head-only tags and anchor (
<a>) relationships are not counted; only link tags in the rendered body qualify. - Presence does not prove the pagination is usable or indexable.
- Modern search handling should not depend solely on legacy rel-next/prev signals.
- This is a correlation-based prioritization signal within a measured result set — not a guarantee of ranking, and not a cause of it.
Related factors
Part of the Factors reference · how RankGear measures · glossary.