Can crawlers follow the links on my page?
A crawler follows a link when it finds an address in it. A link that has no address, or runs a script instead, leads nowhere for a machine, and the pages behind it can go unfound. We count the links on your page that fall short.
What it actually is
On the web a link is an anchor with a destination written into it. People select anything that looks like a link, and a script can make almost any element take them somewhere. A machine reading the HTML sees only the destination in the markup. We look for the anchors used as links that have no destination, the ones whose destination is a script rather than an address, and other elements given an address they cannot carry.
Why it matters
Machines find the rest of your site by following links. A navigation menu built from script-only links, or a list of articles whose cards go somewhere only when clicked, is a menu a crawler cannot walk. The pages behind it are then found only through your sitemap, if you have one, or not at all. Google's own guidance on crawlable links says it cannot reliably extract an address from an anchor that has none.
What good looks like
Navigation and content links that are plain anchors with real web addresses in them. Script can add behaviour on top, such as an animation or a menu that opens, as long as the address is still there underneath.
Being honest about it
We read the HTML as sent, so a link that script fixes up after the page loads can look broken to us while working for visitors; the same is true of crawlers that do not run script, which is the point of the check. We leave alone anchors that are clearly something other than navigation, such as tabs, menu buttons and in-page targets, and anything held in a template. Some crawlers are forgiving of these links, and none should be relied on to be.
Where most sites go wrong
Frameworks that route in the browser and render their links without addresses; menus built from script-only anchors; "javascript:" links left over from older code; and a card that is clickable as a whole, where the address sits on a script instead of on the link. A site can look perfect to a person and be a single page to a crawler.
On the web
In October 2026, 89% of the sites we scanned passed the “Links are real links” check.
| Result | Share of sites |
|---|---|
| Pass | 89% |
| Worth a look | 10% |
| To fix | 1% |
| Couldn't judge | 0% |
Next.js sites pass it most often, at 100%. WordPress sites pass it least often, at 83%.
Not enough history yet.
Based on the sites Bot Appétit has scanned: ones people chose to scan, plus lists we scan for research. Not a random sample of the web.
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