Solving “Alternate Page with Proper Canonical” at Scale
4 min read
Imagine planting a garden. You want every plant to grow nice and tall. But what if some plants were secretly just copies of others? You’d waste water and sunlight on duplicates that don’t need it. That’s what happens in SEO when Google finds alternate versions of your pages—even though you’ve used a canonical tag!
This issue is called “Alternate Page with Proper Canonical”. It’s part of your site’s SEO report in Google Search Console. It simply means: Google has found a page on your site that tells Google, “Hey! I’m a copy of another page. Use that original one!”
Sounds okay, right? Isn’t that what the canonical tag is supposed to do?
Well… kind of. But if you see thousands of these alerts, something’s off. Let’s dive in and learn how to fix it at scale. And let’s keep it simple!
🤔 What Is This “Alternate Page with Proper Canonical” Thing?
When Google crawls your site, it checks if pages are original or duplicates. If a duplicate page says, “Don’t worry, I point to the original via a canonical tag,” Google listens. However, this leaves a trail in your Search Console saying:
“Found a page. It’s a copy. It told us the correct ‘real’ version. We’ll stick with that one.”
That’s fine for a few pages. But if your site has thousands of them, it’s a red flag.
🚩 Why This Is a Problem
Too many “Alternate Page with Proper Canonical” instances can mean:
- Your crawl budget is being wasted.
- Duplicate pages may still get indexed by mistake.
- Your link equity is being spread too thin.
- You confuse search engines, which can hurt rankings.
This is like printing flyers for the same event but with different designs. It’s still one event, but everyone’s getting a different invite. That’s confusing!
🛠️ What Causes These Alternate Pages?
Great question! Here are the most common culprits:
- URL parameters – Like tracking codes or filters (?utm=campaign).
- Session IDs – Temporary links that are technically different pages.
- Printer-friendly or AMP versions of a page.
- Sort and filter pages on eCommerce sites.
- Pagination (Page 1, 2, 3…) where each page is seen as nearly the same.
And don’t forget mobile vs. desktop URLs. If you’ve served them separately and handled the logic manually, duplicate signals might pop up.
🐘 Handling It “At Scale” – The Big Site Problem
If you’ve got 50 pages, fixing this is easy. But what if you have 50,000 pages like an online store or a big blog? That’s where scale matters.
1. Crawl the Site
First step: understand the scope. Use a crawler like:
- Screaming Frog
- Sitebulb
- Ahrefs Site Audit
- DeepCrawl
Set it to crawl your entire domain. Export all indexable URLs and look for URL variants with parameters, trailing slashes, subfolders, or language codes.
2. Identify Canonical Clusters
Cluster pages by their canonical URL. For example:
- /red-shoes?color=red
- /red-shoes?utm=ad1
- /red-shoes?sort=popular
All of them may point to /red-shoes. Perfect! But are all of them actually accessible to users and crawlers?
Look for patterns. These pages should be either:
- Hidden from indexing (via meta=noindex or robots.txt)
- Canonicalized but not linkable (no internal links)
If you link to them, that’s sending mixed signals.
3. Reduce the Duplicates
There are three ways to reduce unnecessary alternate pages from being crawled:
- Use Robots.txt – Block URL patterns and session IDs.
- Use Meta Robots – Add noindex, follow to filter pages.
- Improve Internal Linking – Always link to the canonical version.
This doesn’t mean the canonicals don’t work. But the cleaner your structure, the easier it is for Google to trust your site.
🔄 Automate the Fix
Doing this manually? No thanks. Let the servers do the work.
Server-Side Redirects
If you have duplicate URLs that always resolve to the original, set up 301 redirects from the alternate to the canonical.
For example:
- /product?color=blue → /product
This fixes the issue at the source and tells both users and bots: “This is the real link.”
Parameter Handling Tools
Google Search Console offers something called Parameter Handling. You can tell Google which parameters:
- Change the content
- Don’t change the content
For parameters that don’t matter, tell Google to ignore them. That way, even if the link shows up, Google won’t index it again.
🧠 Don’t Forget Consistency
Once you set your canonicals, be consistent. Follow these golden rules:
- One true URL per page – Link only to the canonical URL internally and externally.
- Sitemaps – Only include canonical URLs.
- Redirects – Always lead to canonical.
- Internal Linking – Use clean URLs everywhere.
Your goal: Make it easy for Google to find and understand your original pages—and only those pages.
📉 Monitor the Results
After all this, your “Alternate Page with Proper Canonical” numbers should drop in Google Search Console.
- Keep checking weekly or monthly.
- Check if any new pages are being flagged.
- Watch for new URL parameters or site changes.
It’s not a one-time thing. SEO is like laundry—it just keeps coming back. But now you know where to toss the duplicates!
🎯 Final Thoughts
No one likes clutter. Not in their homes, not in their code, and definitely not in their URLs. Fixing “Alternate Page with Proper Canonical” at scale is about being organized. It’s about communication.
Tell Google: “Here’s my best version. Ignore the rest.” And then prove it with how your site behaves.
Remember: less confusion = more trust = higher rankings.
Good luck cleaning up those URLs!
