SEO by platform · Updated
Yandex SEO: the basics
Yandex is the main search engine in Russia and is used in several neighbouring countries. Its tools and guidelines are similar to Google's: verify your site in Yandex Webmaster, submit a sitemap, use IndexNow for updates, and write for Russian-speaking users.
Aalhad
Founder, SEO·AEO·GEO
Builds SEO·AEO·GEO and writes the crawler, schema, and citation research published here.
How Yandex serves pages to crawlers
Yandex renders JavaScript in some cases, but server-rendered HTML is the safe choice.
Steps
- Add and verify your site in Yandex Webmaster.
- Submit your sitemap and monitor indexing and errors there.
- Set your site's region in Yandex Webmaster if you target specific regions.
- Use IndexNow: Yandex is one of the search engines that supports it.
- Use the Clean-param directive in robots.txt to tell Yandex which URL parameters (such as tracking codes) don't change content. It's a Yandex-specific directive that other crawlers ignore.
- Write in natural Russian (or the language of your market), not machine translation.
Check it on your own site
What the free audit tests for this
- robots.txt rules
- sitemap.xml
One URL, about 20 seconds, no login. You get the result of every check and the exact fix for the top three issues.
Audit your website freeFAQ
Does Yandex support IndexNow?+
Yes. Yandex is one of the search engines that accepts IndexNow submissions.
Sources
- Yandex Webmaster — Yandex
- IndexNow documentation — IndexNow.org