Why it matters
A selector built as a button works for users but leaves the whole cluster of alternate-language pages without crawlable links, so the cluster is orphaned for Google and depends on sitemaps to be found, which is slow.
How to meet it
Render the selector as a list of <a href> links to the equivalent page in each version, not only to each version's homepage, and keep any visual dropdown on top of those real links.
How to test it
The rendered HTML of any page contains <a href> links to every version of that page, and a crawl starting from one version reaches all the others.
How Regensbot covers it
Decided automatically once Regensbot renders your pages.
Headless Chromium renders the page on an isolated render service, and the raw and the rendered HTML run through the same parsers.
Sources
Google documents02
- 01Link best practices for GoogleGoogle Search Central (opens in a new tab)
- 02Tell Google about localized versions of your pageGoogle Search Central (opens in a new tab)
Claims in the knowledge base02
- D2-C187ConsistentLightning session D: Rendering and JavaScriptShown on screen
- D2-C189n/aLightning session D: Rendering and JavaScriptThe author's interpretation
Claim IDs refer to the Search Central Live 2026 knowledge base. The knowledge base (opens in a new tab)
- Consistent
- Google's documentation supports it without stating it.
- n/a
- Nothing to verify: a quotation, framing, opinion or analysis.