Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Will google penalize a website for using a table layout?
-
I just got a new client today and his entire website layout and structure is using tables instead of divs.
This client is on a tight budget and wants to avoid unnecessary hours for re-coding the website, but at the same time he wants me to improve his SEO organically. This is the first time I've been asked to do work on an existing website that uses pure tables for the entire layout and I'm wondering if this effects the SEO in any way. So my question is, will tables effect rankings and SEO in any way?
-
Great answer. Also, tables are harder to fix later.. the smaller the page, the less your page "weights" - I think right now you should work on fixing architecture, and the rest of the on page stuff. I'm thinking recoding his site to use divs wouldn't have an immediate impact on user engagement. Time spent best, somewhere else. ( Maybe working on errors in WMT )
-
Sounds like something built in early 2000s. Tables won't hurt your SEO directly but it will have a negative impact on pagespeed/load and content optimization. Tables use a lot of extra code that makes it sluggish. I generally always recommend a re-program into DIV/CSS. It's faster, optimized, you will see an SEO benefit.
If your client really doesn't want to do the recode, what I would do is setup all the tags, clean the menu, add any rich snippets that apply, then let them know that's the farthest they'll be able to go without upgrading into DIV/CSS.
-
Hey Scott,
Using tables for a website layout will not affect your rankings directly (aka Google will not give you a penalty for using tables).
However, since tables should be used to present tabular data and not full website layouts, there are certain disadvantages that you should be aware of, and they're very nicely summed up in this post: http://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/6036/why-arent-we-supposed-to-use-table-in-a-design/6037#6037
Hope this helps!
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Do things like using labels on an element that is not a form input affect how google sees us in regards to accessibility?
Do things like using labels on an element that is not a form input affect how google sees us? It's an accessibility error that our devs have made - using a label element because it looks good, not because it's an actual label on a form field. Just wondering how that affects accessibility in Google's eyes.
Web Design | | GregLB0 -
Website rankings drop significantly after moving to new hosting provider
My website - www.isacleanse.co.nz has dropped from being top10 rankings for all of my keywords to not even being in top 50 after just checking now. It used to be hosted on: www.1stdomains.nz
Web Design | | IsaCleanse
It got migrated to Sitground servers about a month ago See attached screenshot - would moving hosting provider cause such a huge drop? Or would there be anything else I should be looking at ? J2ahi0 -
Hiding content until user scrolls - Will Google penalize me?
I've used: "opacity:0;" to hide sections of my content, which are triggered to show (using Javascript) once the user scrolls over these sections. I remember reading a while back that Google essentially ignores content which is hidden from your page (it mentioned they don't index it, so it's close to impossible to rank for it). Is this still the case? Thanks, Sam
Web Design | | Sam.at.Moz0 -
Will interlinking using dynamic parameters in url help us in increasing our rankings
Hi, Will interlinking our internal pages using dynamic parameters(like abc.com/property-in-noida?source=footer) help us in increasing our rankings for linked pages OR we should use static urls for interlinking Regards
Web Design | | vivekrathore0 -
Anyone using CloudFlare on multiple sites?
We are considering using CloudFlare as a CDN for a large group of sites. The fees are $5 to $200 depending on many factors. We tried the free trial on one site and were impressed with the results. I am wondering if any of you have any longer term experience with this and performance metrics, etc.
Web Design | | RobertFisher1 -
How can a Pincode finder website be SEO optimised?
Guys, I wanted to build a simple Pincode finder website for India. The targeted visitors as is obvious will be from India. Alike other Pincode finder websites, the users in this case too will have to key in the location / area of whose pincode he is looking for and they will get Pincode from that very location / area. Other than this, users will also come to this website when they search for something like " <location name="">pincode</location>" on Google (for instance, users will search for something like "Hiranandani Gardens Powai Pincode") Along with data fethced from our sources via Indian postal departments and other data available in public domain, we shall be using data from Google Maps API too. My question in regards to the same is as follows: What should the page-structure / structure of the website be for ranking well on Google? What should be the URL structure? Other suggestions to rank well on Google in this regards? Competition: (You can search for the term "Hiranandani Gardens Powai Pincode" to know how these sites show data) http://www.getpincode.info http://www.pincode.net.in Pls. help...
Web Design | | ShalinTJ0 -
Using H tags and its maximum Limits
hi..
Web Design | | funclub247
I want to Know what is a Maximum limit of using H tags in One Page : for Eg : I Know That I Can use Only One H1 Tag per Page, What about Other H tag Limit..
h1 - 1 time Maximum
h2 - ..?
h3 - ..?
h4 - ..?
h5 - ..?
h6 - ..?
h7 - ..?
.....
i want to target more than 30 key word using H tag as a header of the paragraph...1 -
Best layout pages for SEO
Dear all, what would be the ideal layout of a webpage for SEO? How would a homepage and landingspage look like? Thanks in advance! Best regards, Ben
Web Design | | HMK-NL0