How do I set noindex for one page in Yoast SEO?

Definition: noindex is a directive that tells supporting search engines to exclude a page from their index. As of October 2026, Yoast SEO provides this control for individual WordPress pages through the Advanced tab in its editor sidebar or metabox.

Key facts

• Yoast's noindex instructions place the individual-page control under Allow search engines to show this content in search results, with No as the exclusion setting.
• The meta robots specification specifies noindex, follow for pages excluded from search and gives noindex precedence over index when directives conflict.
• Google's noindex documentation requires the page to remain accessible to its crawler so that the directive can be read.

Where is the setting for one page?

Yoast's individual-item instructions describe this sequence:

1. Open the intended page in the WordPress editor.
2. Open the Yoast SEO sidebar using the Yoast icon at the top right, or use the metabox below the editor.
3. Expand Advanced.
4. Set Allow search engines to show this content in search results to No.

Save the page changes using the editor's update control; WordPress's page documentation describes Update as the control that saves changes.

Yoast's same guide documents separate controls under Yoast SEO > Settings for excluding entire content types. The individual-page procedure keeps the selection scoped to the page being edited.

What robots directive does Yoast generate?

A robots meta tag is an HTML element in the page's <head> containing instructions for search engines. Yoast's functional specification gives this example for a page excluded from search:

<meta name="robots" content="noindex, follow" />

The specification treats a custom page-level noindex value as making the page non-public for its robots output. Here, “non-public” describes the plugin's search-visibility classification.

The same specification sets public-page defaults to index, follow and documents additional snippet and media-preview directives. When reviewing the generated tag, the relevant exclusion value is noindex; the complete list of directives can reflect other page settings.

How can the result be checked?

Google's debugging instructions recommend the URL Inspection tool to examine the HTML Googlebot receives. The check is whether the page's robots meta tag contains noindex. The Page Indexing report in Search Console also tracks pages from which Googlebot extracts this directive.

A robots.txt file controls crawler access to URLs. Blocking this page there prevents Googlebot from fetching its tag. Google also states that putting the noindex rule in robots.txt is unsupported.

Related terms

• noindex
• Meta robots
• robots.txt
• Can Google read noindex on a page blocked by robots.txt?

FAQ

Why can I not see the Advanced tab?

Yoast's permissions guidance says only editors and administrators have access by default. If you lack access, an administrator can review which users may use the Advanced tab.

Do I also need to select nofollow?

Yoast's robots specification pairs search exclusion with noindex, follow. A separate nofollow setting takes precedence over follow if applied.

Why does the page still appear in Google?

Google's noindex troubleshooting guidance says Googlebot must crawl the page again to see the change. You can request a recrawl with URL Inspection while keeping the page accessible to Googlebot.

Sources

1. Yoast, "Yoast SEO Meta robots: Functional specification", undated
2. Yoast, "How to noindex URLs", undated
3. WordPress.org, "Create pages", updated 13 January 2023
4. Google Search Central, "Block Search indexing with noindex", updated 10 December 2025

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