Do your page and sitemap hreflang agree?
Google accepts hreflang on the page or in the sitemap, but not inconsistently. This reads both and reports which method you use and whether they conflict.
Reads hreflang from the page head and from the sitemap. Nothing is stored.
How this check works
Shipwork reads the hreflang alternates in your page head and the xhtml:link entries in your sitemap, then reports which method you use and whether the two sets disagree. Declaring both inconsistently is worse than one.
Questions
- Page tags or sitemap, which is better?
- Either works. Page-level hreflang is more common; sitemap hreflang suits very large sites. Pick one and keep it consistent.
- What does a conflict look like?
- The page declares one set of languages and the sitemap declares a different set. The signal is muddled and Google may ignore it.
- Does this check reciprocity?
- Reciprocity (each version linking back) is checked by the hreflang check on the page. This check compares page and sitemap declarations.