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FREE ROBOTS META TAG GENERATOR

Generate page-level robots meta tags for index, noindex, follow, nofollow, snippet, image, and video controls — plus X-Robots-Tag HTTP header output. Entirely browser-based.

100% Browser-BasedNo Signup RequiredInstant Generation

Quick Presets

Core Directives

Indexing
Link Following

Search / Appearance

Validation

  • Robots meta tags are hints. Google and other search engines may take time to reflect directives. Use Google Search Console to request removal for urgent cases.
<meta name="robots">
HTML Meta Tag
<meta name="robots" content="index, follow">
X-Robots-Tag HTTP Header
X-Robots-Tag: index, follow

Use the HTTP header for non-HTML resources such as PDFs and images — these cannot contain a <meta> tag.

2 directives: index, follow
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Fundamentals

What Is a Robots Meta Tag?

A robots meta tag is an HTML element placed inside the section of a webpage that provides page-level directives to search engine crawlers. It instructs bots whether to index the page, follow its links, show a search result snippet, display images, and more.
The standard syntax is: <meta name="robots" content="noindex, nofollow">. The name attribute is always "robots" for search engines. Individual directives are listed in the content attribute, separated by commas. The tag is recognized by Google, Bing, and most major search engines.
Function

What Does the Robots Meta Tag Control?

The robots meta tag provides fine-grained, page-level control over how search engines handle a specific page. Unlike robots.txt, which applies broadly to paths and directories across a site, the robots meta tag is scoped to one page and is read by crawlers after they visit the page.
Key behaviors it can control include: whether the page appears in search results (index / noindex); whether links on the page are followed and pass ranking signals (follow / nofollow); whether text or video snippets appear in search results (nosnippet / max-snippet); the size of image previews (max-image-preview); the length of video previews (max-video-preview); and image indexing in Google Images (noimageindex).
How To Use

How to Use the Robots Meta Tag Generator

Start by selecting one of the quick presets: Default Indexable pre-fills the standard index, follow combination; Noindex excludes the page from results while still following links; Noindex + Nofollow fully isolates the page; No Snippet allows indexing but suppresses text previews. Select Custom to build from scratch.
Configure the core directives (indexing and following), then enable any appearance options you need. The Advanced section provides indexifembedded and unavailable_after for specialized use cases. The dark output panel shows the generated meta tag and X-Robots-Tag header updating in real time. Click Copy Meta Tag to copy the HTML element, or Copy X-Robots-Tag Header for server-level delivery.
Index / Noindex

Index vs Noindex

index is the default behavior — search engines are permitted to crawl and include the page in their index, display it in search results, and show a snippet. You only need to explicitly write index if you are overriding a more restrictive rule set by a parent directive.
noindex tells search engines not to include the page in their index. Once Googlebot recrawls the page and reads the noindex directive, the page will eventually be removed from Google Search results. This is the most reliable method for removing a page from search results. For immediate removal, combine noindex with a URL removal request in Google Search Console.
Follow / Nofollow

Follow vs Nofollow

follow is the default behavior — crawlers are permitted to follow links on the page and pass ranking signals (link equity) to the pages those links point to. You do not need to explicitly include follow unless overriding nofollow.
nofollow instructs crawlers not to follow any links on the page. This means the crawlers will not traverse to linked pages from this page, and the links will not pass PageRank. Note that nofollow does not affect whether the current page is indexed — it only affects how links on that page are treated. nofollow also does not guarantee crawlers will completely ignore linked pages if those pages are discovered through other means.
Combination

The noindex, nofollow Combination

Combining noindex and nofollow is appropriate for pages you want fully isolated from search engines: the page is removed from search results and its links do not pass ranking signals. This is commonly applied to: admin pages, login screens, staging environments, confirmation pages (e.g. order confirmations), internal search results, and private member-only pages.
Even with noindex, nofollow, Google may still crawl the page if it discovers the URL from other sources (such as a sitemap or external links). Crawling and indexing are separate — crawling is how Google reads the page; indexing is whether it appears in results. noindex controls indexing; nofollow affects only link equity on the page.
Nosnippet

Nosnippet and Search Result Previews

nosnippet prevents search engines from displaying a text description or an animated video preview below the page title in search results. When nosnippet is active, search engines will typically show only the page URL and title, with no excerpt of content.
This directive is useful for pages where you want to control exactly what users see before clicking, or for pages where the automatically generated snippet misrepresents the content. It does not affect indexing — the page can still be indexed and ranked; it just appears in results without a description.
Snippet Length

max-snippet and Snippet Length

max-snippet:[number] sets an upper limit on the number of characters that can be used in a text snippet displayed in search results. For example, max-snippet:100 limits the snippet to 100 characters. Setting max-snippet:0 has the same effect as nosnippet.
This gives you a middle ground: rather than suppressing snippets entirely, you can control how much content is previewed. Note that if nosnippet is also set, max-snippet has no effect — nosnippet takes precedence.
Image Preview

max-image-preview and Image Previews

max-image-preview:[size] controls the maximum size of an image preview displayed for the page in search results. The three allowed values are: none (no image preview), standard (default size), and large (a larger image, commonly used in rich result features such as image carousels).
Google Discover and rich results often require large image previews to display a page. If you want your content eligible for prominent image-based placements, set max-image-preview:large. If you want to prevent image previews from appearing in search results, set max-image-preview:none.
Video Preview

max-video-preview and Video Previews

max-video-preview:[seconds] sets the maximum number of seconds that can be used for an animated video preview in search results. A value of 0 prevents video previews entirely. A value of -1 means no limit — Google can show a preview of any length. A positive integer (e.g. max-video-preview:10) allows up to that many seconds.
Animated video previews are shown on some Google search result pages and on Google Discover. If the page contains an embedded video and you do not want it previewed in results, set max-video-preview:0.
Image Indexing

noimageindex and Image Indexing

noimageindex tells search engines not to index images found on the page in image search results (such as Google Images). The page itself can still be indexed and appear in web search — noimageindex only affects image indexing, not page indexing.
This directive is useful for pages where images are decorative or licensed under restrictions that prevent their appearance in image search. It does not affect images hosted on other pages that link to the images directly.
vs robots.txt

Robots Meta Tags vs robots.txt

robots.txt and the robots meta tag are complementary tools that operate at different levels. robots.txt controls crawler access at the server level — it tells crawlers which paths they are permitted to visit before they crawl them. The robots meta tag controls indexing at the page level — it is read by a crawler after it visits and reads the page's HTML.
The most critical rule: do not block a page in robots.txt and add a noindex meta tag on that same page. If a crawler is blocked by robots.txt, it cannot access the page to read the noindex directive — so the noindex tag has no effect. For noindex to work, the page must be crawlable.
vs X-Robots-Tag

Robots Meta Tags vs X-Robots-Tag

The robots meta tag is an HTML element that only exists inside an HTML page's section. For this reason, it can only control the indexing of HTML pages. Non-HTML resources — such as PDFs, images, JavaScript files, CSS files, and videos — cannot contain an HTML meta tag.
The X-Robots-Tag is an HTTP response header that carries the same directives and is delivered by the web server as part of the HTTP response. Because it works at the HTTP level, it applies to any type of resource — HTML or non-HTML. If you want to control how search engines handle a PDF or image file, use the X-Robots-Tag header on that resource. This generator outputs both the HTML tag and the HTTP header for your convenience.
Common Mistakes

Common Robots Meta Tag Mistakes

The most common mistake is placing a robots meta tag inside the instead of the . Search engines only read robots meta tags found in the HTML section — a tag in the body is ignored.
Other common mistakes include: blocking a page in robots.txt and adding noindex on the same page (the crawler cannot read noindex if it cannot crawl the page); adding noarchive thinking it prevents indexing (it does not — it only prevents the cached copy); expecting nofollow to prevent discovery of linked pages (crawlers may find those pages through other links); and using both nosnippet and max-snippet together (nosnippet takes precedence and max-snippet has no effect).
Deployment

How to Add and Verify a Robots Meta Tag

After generating the tag with this tool, paste the element into the section of your HTML page — not in the body. For CMS platforms like WordPress, use an SEO plugin (such as Yoast SEO or Rank Math) that provides a per-page noindex toggle, or paste the tag into your theme's header template for a specific page.
To verify the tag is working, use Google Search Console's URL Inspection tool. Enter the URL, request an inspection, and review the Coverage and Indexing sections to confirm how Google sees the page. Alternatively, view the page source in your browser (Ctrl+U) and search for "robots" to confirm the tag is present in the section.
FAQ

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about robots meta tags and how to use this generator.

TOOL GUIDE

How to Use This Generator

  1. 1
    Step 1 — Choose a preset

    Select Default Indexable, Noindex, Noindex + Nofollow, No Snippet, or Custom to start from a sensible configuration.

  2. 2
    Step 2 — Set indexing

    Toggle between index (allow search engines to index this page) and noindex (exclude from results).

  3. 3
    Step 3 — Set link following

    Toggle between follow (allow crawlers to follow links) and nofollow (do not follow or pass ranking signals).

  4. 4
    Step 4 — Configure appearance options

    Enable nosnippet, noimageindex, notranslate, and configure max-snippet, max-image-preview, and max-video-preview as needed.

  5. 5
    Step 5 — Review advanced options

    Enable indexifembedded or unavailable_after if required for your use case.

  6. 6
    Step 6 — Copy the output

    Click Copy Meta Tag to copy the HTML element, or Copy X-Robots-Tag Header to copy the HTTP header version for PDFs and non-HTML resources.

Runs locally in browser • No server uploads

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