Definition

An external link is an `<a href>` anchor whose destination URL lives on a different domain from the page containing the link.

External links are how the web connects across sites and how search engines discover content beyond a single domain. Google's outbound link guidance covers when to qualify external links with `rel="nofollow"`, `rel="sponsored"` or `rel="ugc"`, and notes that regular external links without any `rel` attribute will be fetched and parsed normally. From the destination site's perspective, the same anchor is a backlink.

Examples

• Citing a research source

  A blog post about climate data links out to a government dataset on a different domain. From the blog's perspective the anchor is an external link; from the dataset's perspective it is an inbound backlink.

• Footer link to a partner

  A small business website includes an external link in the footer to a partner organisation's homepage. The anchor uses no rel attribute, so Google treats it as a standard outbound link.

Sources

• Google Search Central — Qualify your outbound links to Google
• Google Search Central — Make your links crawlable

Related terms

• Backlink
  A hyperlink on one website that points at another. Search engines treat backlinks as one signal of how the wider web vouches for a page.
• Internal Linking
  The practice of linking from one page on a site to another page on the same site. Helps users navigate and gives search engines more crawl paths.
• Nofollow
  A link attribute (`rel="nofollow"`) telling search engines not to associate the source page with — or pass ranking credit to — the linked page.
• Dofollow Link
  A regular HTML link with no rel qualification, which search engines crawl and treat as a standard endorsement of the destination page.
• Sponsored Link
  A link marked with rel="sponsored" to indicate it was created as part of an advertisement, sponsorship, or other paid placement.
• UGC Link
  A link marked with rel="ugc" to indicate it was created in user-generated content such as a forum post, comment, or review.
• Anchor Text
  The visible, clickable text inside a hyperlink. Search engines use it as a hint about the topic of the page being linked to.
• Link Building
  The practice of acquiring inbound links from other websites, ranging from editorial outreach to schemes that Google classifies as link spam.

Where QueryCatch uses this

• SEO Audit
• Page Optimisation