Nofollow, Sponsored and UGC Links: When to Use Each

The short answer

The rel attribute on a link tells the search engine how you relate to the page you link to:

Values can be combined with a space: rel="ugc nofollow".

Where the three attributes came from

For a long time there was only nofollow. In 2019 Google added sponsored and ugc so site owners could describe a link's nature more precisely. At the same time, Google began treating all three as hints rather than strict commands: the search engine may still consider such a link in its analysis or use it to discover new pages.

For Google, nofollow is still acceptable for both ads and comments. The new values simply add precision.

Yandex documentation has historically focused on nofollow. To avoid depending on how each search engine interprets the newer values, it is convenient to mark ad links with rel="sponsored nofollow" — every engine will understand it the same way.

Typical situations

Paid article or banner. Any link paid for with money, goods or services must have sponsored or nofollow. Without it, search engines see it as an attempt to buy rankings — a direct path to a manual action in Google and the Minusinsk filter in Yandex.

<a href="https://partner.example/" rel="sponsored nofollow">Partner</a>

Affiliate program. Referral links to products are a commercial relationship too, so sponsored fits.

Comments and forums. If users can post links, apply ugc (or ugc nofollow) by default. It discourages spammers and protects your site's reputation. Links from trusted long-time members can later be left without an attribute.

Source links in an article. If you chose the source yourself and recommend it, no attribute is needed. Adding nofollow to every external link "just in case" is a bad habit: it makes the site look unnatural.

Internal links. Do not put nofollow on links to your own pages. It will not redistribute weight between pages, and the crawler will understand your site structure worse. If a page should not be indexed, use noindex.

What these attributes do not do

• They do not block indexing. If other links point to the page, it can still be indexed. Use noindex for that.
• They are not about security. noopener and noreferrer are different rel values that protect users when a link opens in a new tab; they do not affect SEO.
• They do not penalize the target site. A nofollow link simply passes fewer signals or none at all.

Site checklist

1. Find all paid and affiliate links and add sponsored to them.
2. Configure your CMS so links in comments and reviews automatically get ugc.
3. Remove nofollow from internal links and from editorial links to good sources.
4. Check templates: widgets and counters should not inject hidden paid links.
5. Write a rule for authors and the ad team so new content is marked up correctly from the start.