rel=ugc for user links: Crawl Audit check 65

Short answer: links that your visitors add, in comments, reviews or forum posts, aren't links you chose. Google recommends marking them rel="ugc" (user-generated content). Check 65 is informational and always passes. It reports how many ugc links it found, as a reminder if your site accepts user posts.

What Crawl Audit checks

• Pass: ugc links found, with a count.
• Pass: none found, with a reminder to add rel="ugc" if you have comments or forums.

What Google says

• "We recommend marking user-generated content (UGC) links, such as comments and forum posts, with the ugc value."
• Like sponsored and nofollow, ugc is a hint: since 2019, "All the link attributes, sponsored, ugc, and nofollow, now work today as hints".

<a href="https://example.com" rel="ugc">a link from a comment</a>

Why it's worth doing

Comment sections attract spam links. Marking user links as ugc tells search engines you didn't vouch for them, and gives spammers less reason to post. Moderation still matters more than markup: a spam comment with rel="ugc" is still a spam comment your visitors see.

On your platform

• WordPress: core comments add nofollow to commenters' links. Check your theme's output if you want ugc too.
• Shopify, Wix and Squarespace: comment and review apps handle their own link markup. Check one page in view-source.
• Next.js: add rel="ugc nofollow" wherever you render links from user input.

Sources

• Google Search Central, Qualify your outbound links to Google, checked 3 October 2026.
• Google Search Central blog, Evolving "nofollow", 10 September 2019.