A practical starting point
Work through these checks in order. Use the results to decide what needs to change in your own workflow.
- Choose a consistent language-routing convention.
- Provide visible links between equivalent versions.
- Keep language metadata and canonical URLs aligned with the actual content.
A translated homepage can have its own canonical URL rather than declaring the English page as its duplicate.
A mistake to avoid
Do not force visitors into a language based only on inferred location.
How to check progress
Test direct access and switching for every supported language.
Your action checklist
Use this checklist while reviewing your own setup. Checkmarks are temporary and stay in this open page.
Need the wider workflow?
This quick note covers one decision. For a worked example, decision table and a fuller implementation workflow, read Using country pages without creating doorway content.
Further reading
Official background resources for this topic. The workflow above is general guidance, not a guarantee of a particular result.
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