About This HTML Issue
The rel attribute on an <a> element has the value noindex, which is not a recognized link type. The validator matched it against the registered keywords and guessed it might be a misspelling of index.
In practice noindex is rarely a typo for index. Authors usually write rel="noindex" because they want to keep a page out of search results, but rel cannot do that. The attribute describes the relationship between the current document and the linked resource, not whether a page should be indexed.
Indexing is a page-level directive. To keep a page out of search results, add a robots meta tag to that page's <head>, or send the equivalent X-Robots-Tag HTTP header. Both apply to the page being excluded, not to a link pointing at it.
If your goal is to stop search engines from passing ranking through a link, the correct rel value is nofollow.
Invalid example
<a href="/private" rel="noindex">Members area</a>
Valid example
Use rel="nofollow" on the link when you want search engines to ignore it:
<a href="/private" rel="nofollow">Members area</a>
To keep the destination page itself out of search results, control indexing on that page instead:
<meta name="robots" content="noindex">
Find issues like this automatically
Rocket Validator scans thousands of pages in seconds, detecting HTML issues across your entire site.
Help us improve our guides
Was this guide helpful?
Validate at scale.
Ship accessible websites, faster.
Automated HTML & accessibility validation for large sites. Check thousands of pages against WCAG guidelines and W3C standards in minutes, not days.
Pro Trial
Full Pro access. Cancel anytime.
Start Pro Trial →Join teams across 40+ countries