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        4. Disallow URLs ENDING with certain values in robots.txt?

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        Disallow URLs ENDING with certain values in robots.txt?

        Intermediate & Advanced SEO
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        • jmorehouse
          jmorehouse last edited by

          Is there any way to disallow URLs ending in a certain value? For example, if I have the following product page URL: http://website.com/category/product1, and I want to disallow /category/product1/review, /category/product2/review, etc. without disallowing the product pages themselves, is there any shortcut to do this, or must I disallow each gallery page individually?

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • Andy.Drinkwater
            Andy.Drinkwater @jmorehouse last edited by

            Excellent stuff. Glad it helped 🙂

            -Andy

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • jmorehouse
              jmorehouse @Andy.Drinkwater last edited by

              Thanks, Andy! I just tested with Webmaster tool's tester, and it worked.

              Andy.Drinkwater 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
              • Andy.Drinkwater
                Andy.Drinkwater last edited by

                So you just want to disallow the /review/ element?

                *Disallow: /review/

                I am pretty sure the wildcard will work.

                I would use the Robots.txt tester in Webmaster tools to try it out first before committing to any changes. This will tell you if it works and if so, if it's blocked successfully.

                You then try the URL without the /review/ element on and make sure it passes.

                -Andy

                jmorehouse 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
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