Why does hreflang matter for AI citations?

It helps crawlers and retrieval systems pick the right language version of a page for a user query, especially in multilingual markets.

/evaluators

GEO · geo-hreflang

Hreflang Evaluator

Checks whether multilingual pages expose consistent hreflang or alternate-language signals for global and APAC AI search.

What it checks

AI search results vary by language and location. Clear language alternates help models map Traditional Chinese, English, and Japanese pages to the right audience.

Pass criteria

Canonical pages expose correct alternate language URLs.
Language variants are content-equivalent, not thin translations.
Sitemap and page metadata use consistent locale labels.

Example

<link rel="alternate" href="https://example.com/pricing" hreflang="zh-TW" />
<link rel="alternate" href="https://example.com/pricing?lang=en" hreflang="en" />
<link rel="alternate" href="https://example.com/pricing?lang=ja" hreflang="ja" />

Common failures

- Using hreflang values that do not match the page content.
- Only translating navigation while leaving core answers in one language.
- Sitemap alternates drift from page metadata.

Related surfaces

MCP aeo_scan /for/saas /docs/api

FAQ

Why does hreflang matter for AI citations?: It helps crawlers and retrieval systems pick the right language version of a page for a user query, especially in multilingual markets.