Link rel
By default, WordPress doesn't allow you to add a "rel" attribute to links. So all links are "dofollow". It's not helpful for SEO if you have a link building strategy, where you need "nofollow" or "sponsored" links.
Nofollow links
Nofollow links are links with a rel="nofollow" attribute. When setting a link nofollow, we're telling the search engines' bots to not follow it. Using nofollow links, we're not passing link juice (or page rank) to the target website, and thus, doesn't affect its ranking.
Link juice is the term used in the SEO world to refer to the value or equity passed from one page or site to another. This value is passed through hyperlinks. Search engines see links as votes by other websites that your page is valuable and worth promoting.
rel="nofollow" doesn't strictly mean links are not used for crawling and indexing. It's used as a "hint" for search engines only because it still helps them to understand the context/content of the link and the connection between two websites.
Nofollow links also drive traffic to the target website (despite leaving rankings untouched) and help increase brand awareness.
Sponsored link
Sponsored links are links with the rel="sponsored" attribute. They're specifically used for paid or promotional links.
Before this, paid links were categorized as nofollow links, which proved to be extremely misleading. The new sponsored attribute helps Google identify advertising links separately.
UGC links
UGC (user-generated content) links are links with the rel="ugc" attribute. They help Google determine which links are generated by users.
The UGC attribute is used to link to sections of websites where users generate their content, e.g. comment sections, forums posts, etc.
In WordPress, all links in the comments automatically have the rel="ugc".
Setting link rel
Slim SEO allows you to set the rel attribute to nofollow, sponsored, or ugc (user-generated content) easily. And it works in both classic and block editors.
If you're using the classic editor, simply tick the checkboxes for the rel attribute:
If you're using the block editor, toggle the rel attribute as follows:
