Anchor Text

What is anchor text?

Anchor text is the visible, clickable text in a hyperlink. In modern browsers, it's often blue and underlined, such as this link to the Moz homepage.

Code sample

<a href="http://www.example.com">Example Anchor Text</a>

Optimal format

SEO-friendly anchor text is succinct and relevant to the target page (i.e., the page it's linking to).

Anchor text defined

Anchor text is the visible characters and words that hyperlinks display when linking to another document or location on the web. It usually appears as blue underlined text, but you change your website's link colors and styles through your HTML or CSS.

Anchor text can provide both search engines and users relevant contextual information about the content of the link's destination.

Anchor text html example

In the above example of the link code, ‘Tiny dancing horse’ is the anchor text for the link.

Search engines use external anchor text (text other pages use to link to your site) as a reflection of how other people view your page — and by extension, what your pages may be about. While website owners typically can't control how other sites link to theirs, “you can make sure that anchor text you use within your own site is useful, descriptive, and relevant.” (Source: Google)

If many sites think that a particular page is relevant for a given set of terms, that page can manage to rank well even if the terms don't appear in the text itself.

Types of anchor text

Exact-match

Anchor text is "exact match" if it includes a keyword that mirrors the page that is being linked to. For example: 'link building' linking to a page about link building.

Partial-match

Anchor text that includes a variation of the keyword on the linked-to page. For example: 'link building strategies' linking to a page about link building.

Branded

A brand name used as anchor text. For example: 'Moz' linking to an article on the Moz Blog.

Naked link

A URL that is used as an anchor. For example: 'www.moz.com' is a naked link anchor.

Generic

A generic word or phrase that is used as the anchor. "Click here" is a common generic anchor.

Images

Whenever an image is linked, Google will use the text contained in the image's alt attribute as the anchor text.

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SEO best practices

SEO-friendly anchor text is:

  • Succinct
  • Relevant to the linked-to page
  • Low keyword density (not overly keyword-heavy)
  • Not generic

Keep in mind that you often don't have any control over the anchor text that other sites use to link back to your own content. So, most of these best practices will govern how to best use anchor text within your own website.

Succinct anchor text

While there isn't a specific length limit for anchor text, it's a good idea to keep your link text as succinct as possible. At the end of the day, though, the terms you choose to include in your anchor text should take two main factors into consideration:

  • What is the most concise, accurate way to describe the linked-to page?
  • What word or phrase would encourage users to click on a link?

Target page relevance

As search engines have matured, they have started identifying more metrics for determining rankings. One metric that stands out among the rest is link relevancy, or how related the topic of page A is to page B if one links to the other. A highly relevant link can improve the likelihood of both page A and page B ranking for queries related to their topic.

Link relevancy is a natural phenomenon that occurs when people link out to other content on the web. It is determined by:

  • The topic of the source page
  • The content of anchor text on that source page

Links that point to content related to the topic of the source page are likely to send stronger relevance signals than links pointing to unrelated content. For instance, a page about the best lattes in Seattle is likely to pass a better relevance signal to Google when it links to a coffee shop's website than it is when it links to a site with pictures of baby animals.

Search engines pay attention to the different anchor text variations being used to link back to the original article and use them as additional indicators of what that article is about - and for which search queries it might be relevant. This, in combination with natural language processing and other factors like link source and information hierarchy, make up the lion's share of link relevancy indicators online. To ensure your links send strong relevancy signals, keep your anchor text as descriptive of the target page as possible.

Anchor text keyword density

With the Penguin algorithm update, Google began to look more closely at keywords in anchor text. If too many of a site's inbound links contain the exact same anchor text, it can start to appear suspicious and may be a sign that the links weren't acquired naturally. In general, it's still a best practice to obtain and use keyword- and topic-specific anchor text when possible. However, SEOs may get better results by striving for a variety of more natural anchor text phrases rather than the same keyword each time.

Along those lines, one important note: Don't overdo it with keyword-heavy internal links. Internal linking is certainly a recommended best practice, but be careful with the anchor text you use to link your own pages together. If too many links to a page all use the same anchor text, even if they're on your own site, Google might sense spammy behavior.

Frequently asked questions

How do you optimize an anchor text?

The simplest way to optimize anchor text for SEO is simply to make sure the anchor text uses descriptive keywords to accurately describe the page or idea you're linking to. But be careful! In SEO, it's easy to "over-optimize" your anchor text by over-relying on repetitive, keyword-rich phrases. In the real world, people don't always link with the "perfect" anchor text, and it's often best to mimic this practice in your own linking.

What is rich anchor text?

Rich anchor text simply means anchor text containing desirable, target keywords. These are often keywords you'd like to rank for. Again, don't overdo your rich anchor text as this isn't how people normally or naturally link, and could lead to Google seeing your content as "over-optimized."

Does anchor text matter?

Anchor text matters greatly to SEO, as it can indicate to Google what a page is about. In fact, using anchor text as a ranking signal is included in several Google patents. Not using anchor text or using generic anchor text, such as "click here" is generally considered a poor SEO practice.

Keep learning

Additional Articles on Link Building

Off-Page SEO
Internal Links
External Links

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