Nosnippet is a value you can set in a robots meta tag or an X-Robots-Tag header. Google's documentation says it blocks text snippets and video previews in all forms of search results, and also prevents the content from being a direct input for AI Overviews and AI Mode. The page can still rank and appear with a title link. A related attribute, data-nosnippet, does the same job for selected parts of a page.
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How to set it
Use the meta tag for HTML pages and the header for any file type. The data-nosnippet attribute works on span, div and section elements, and any value given to it is ignored, so data-nosnippet="false" still excludes the content. The HTML around it must be valid, with tags closed properly.
<meta name="robots" content="nosnippet">
X-Robots-Tag: nosnippet
<p>Our plans start at a set price.
<span data-nosnippet>Internal note for existing customers.</span>
</p>How it interacts with other rules
Google treats max-snippet:0 as equivalent to nosnippet. When rules conflict, the more restrictive one applies, so a page with both max-snippet:50 and nosnippet gets nosnippet.
A static image thumbnail may still be visible, so use max-image-preview if images are the concern. If a preview control seems to be ignored, Google suggests first confirming that it is correct and visible to Googlebot. Changes also take time, since Google has to recrawl the page and process them.
The trade-off
A result with no description gives searchers less reason to click, and featured snippets draw on the same text. AI features have a similar requirement: to be a supporting link, a page must be indexed and eligible to be shown with a snippet. A whole-page nosnippet is a serious step for any page that relies on search traffic.
Most sites are better served by data-nosnippet on the specific passage they want to keep out, or by max-snippet for a length limit.
Example
Protecting one block on a pricing page
Hypothetical payroll SaaS Ambercount found search results quoting an old promotional footnote from its pricing page. A team member suggested nosnippet for the whole page.
That would have removed the description from a page that needs clicks, so the team wrapped the footnote in a div with data-nosnippet and left the rest of the page available for snippets.
Common mistakes
Expecting nosnippet to remove a page from results
The rule controls previews. To keep a page out of Search altogether, use noindex.
Blocking the page in robots.txt as well
Googlebot has to be able to fetch a page to see a rule set on it. If the URL is disallowed, the rule may never be read.
Frequently Asked Questions
Google says it prevents content from being used as a direct input for AI Overviews and AI Mode. Allow time for Google to recrawl and process the change.
It is a preview control and not an indexing rule, so the page stays eligible for results. Fewer people may click on a result with no description.
Support varies by search engine. Check each engine's documentation, since this page draws on Google's.
Keep reading
- Snippet Controls: Snippet controls are robots directives such as nosnippet, max-snippet and data-nosnippet that limit how much of a page Google may show as a text or image preview, including in its AI features.
- Robots Meta Tag: The robots meta tag is an HTML tag in a page's head that tells search engines whether to index the page, follow its links and show snippets.
- X-Robots-Tag: X-Robots-Tag is an HTTP response header that sends robots directives like noindex. It works for PDFs and other non-HTML files a meta tag cannot reach.
- Featured Snippet: A featured snippet is a highlighted excerpt from a web page that Google shows near the top of results to answer a query directly, with a link to the source.
- AMP: AMP is a web framework for building fast-loading pages under strict rules on JavaScript and CSS. Google no longer requires it for the Top Stories carousel.
- Cache-Control: Cache-Control is an HTTP header that tells browsers and CDNs whether and how long to store a response. Good caching makes repeat loads and crawls faster.
- Canonical URL: A canonical URL is the version of a page search engines treat as the main one when several URLs show the same or very similar content.
- Canonicalization: Canonicalization is the process of choosing one preferred URL when several pages have duplicate or very similar content, so search engines know which version to show.
