Next.js SEO Checklist

Direct answer: every public page needs its own title, description, canonical, and social image. Add a sitemap of those URLs, declare it in robots.txt, and emit JSON-LD that matches what users see. Prefer server-rendered HTML so crawlers see content without waiting on client fetch.

This page is the Next.js SEO cluster hub. Pair it with Rendering Strategies and Update Content Without Redeploying.

When to use this

• Launching or auditing a Next.js marketing or handbook site
• Dynamic routes need per-slug metadata
• Search Console shows missing or duplicate titles

When not to use this

• Fully private authenticated apps with noindex by design
• You only need React runtime performance tips: see Performance

App Router pattern

// app/articles/[slug]/page.tsx
import type { Metadata } from 'next'

export async function generateMetadata({ params }): Promise<Metadata> {
  const article = await getArticle(params.slug)
  const url = `https://www.example.com/articles/${article.slug}`
  return {
    title: `${article.title} | Example`,
    description: article.description,
    alternates: { canonical: url },
    openGraph: {
      title: article.title,
      description: article.description,
      url,
      type: 'article',
      images: [{ url: article.ogImage }],
    },
  }
}

Also add app/sitemap.ts and app/robots.ts (or static files) so the sitemap lists only canonical, indexable URLs.

Pages Router pattern

Centralize <Head> (or a shared Seo component) with title, description, canonical, OG, Twitter, and JSON-LD. Build sitemap.xml at build time from your content index. ReactField uses this approach.

Checklist

• One <title> and one meta description per indexable route
• Visible <h1> matches the topic
• Canonical uses the preferred host (www or apex), consistently
• OG title, description, and image present
• robots.txt allows important paths and points at the sitemap
• Sitemap omits noindex, previews, and utility routes
• Optional /llms.txt (and /llms-full.txt) for LLM agent discovery
• JSON-LD validates in Rich Results Test for a sample article
• Article HTML is present in View Source, not only after hydration

Common mistakes

• Default title reused on every page
• Sitemap on a different host than the canonical
• Client-only content with empty first HTML
• Using robots.txt instead of noindex for soft-private pages

Related

• Next.js
• When to use SSR, SSG, ISR, or CSR
• React Server vs Client Components

Final recommendation

Treat SEO as route data: unique metadata, stable canonicals, a clean sitemap, and HTML that already contains the article. Framework APIs differ between App and Pages Router; the checklist does not.