Orphan Page
An orphan page is a page on your website that isn’t linked to from any other internal page. It exists within your site’s structure but is essentially disconnected, meaning both users and search engines may struggle to find it.
Since search engines use internal links to discover and crawl content, orphan pages can go unnoticed — even if they contain useful information. Without links pointing to them, orphan pages often receive little or no traffic, and they’re less likely to rank in search results.
Why orphan pages matter in SEO
Orphan pages can negatively affect your SEO for several reasons:
- They may not get crawled or indexed by search engines
- They don’t receive link equity from other pages
- They confuse site structure and can lower site quality signals
- They miss out on user traffic since visitors can’t easily navigate to them
- They can waste crawl budget if accessible only via sitemaps or direct URLs
While not always harmful, orphan pages are often signs of content management issues, and it's best to clean them up or reintegrate them into your internal linking strategy.
Common causes of orphan pages
| Cause | Description |
|---|---|
| Content migration issues | Pages left behind during a site redesign or CMS change |
| Manual URL access only | Pages created for specific campaigns but not linked internally |
| Mistakes in navigation | Pages unintentionally excluded from menus, sitemaps, or internal links |
| Expired links | Other pages that linked to it were removed or redirected |
HTML example: Internal link to avoid orphaning
<a href="/blog/seo-content-strategy">Learn how to create an SEO content strategy</a>
Adding links like this within relevant pages ensures that new content is connected and discoverable.
How to fix orphan pages
- Use a tool like Screaming Frog, Ahrefs, or Google Search Console to find orphan pages
- Add internal links from relevant pages or posts
- Include them in your navigation menus or category pages
- Make sure they’re in your XML sitemap
- If they’re outdated or unnecessary, consider redirecting or removing them
In summary, an orphan page is a page without internal links pointing to it, making it nearly invisible to users and search engines. Identifying and fixing orphan pages improves crawlability, SEO performance, and overall site structure.