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Text in tables and SEO - Pros & Cons?

by TuNguyen
10 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Hey guys,

I remember a while ago (a very long time ago), Google had issues reading texts inside tables.

May I ask if anyone know whether Google has gotten better at reading text inside tables on normal html pages yet?

Are there any SEO downsides of using text in tables? are there any upsides?

Thanks!
#cons #pros #seo #tables #text
  • Profile picture of the author TheContentAuthority
    Tunguyen,

    To the best of my knowledge, the only content Google can’t index are images, flash and similar objects. If the text is simply contained in <tr><td></td></tr> tags I’m sure Googlebot can still read the text.

    Maybe you can find a definitive answer here,

    https://sites.google.com/site/webmas...xing---ranking

    Best,

    Shawn
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    We customize your Blog, eBook, Press Release and Sale Copy content with your message.

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  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    Google doesn't have a problem reading text in tables.

    Show me a table where the page has a Google Cache & I can prove it, by showing you the Google Cache (text version).

    Keep in mind you can put anything you want inside a table (iframe, javascript, flash, etc...), still the table itself will show plain text just fine in a Google Cache (text version).
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    • Profile picture of the author TuNguyen
      Great news, thanks guys, much appreciated!
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      • Profile picture of the author paulgl
        Text in tables?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

        Holy cow. Every table I make and see has text in it. That's what
        they were designed for...

        Where are you people living that you keep coming up with this stuff?

        Tables are probably the most valuable tool in html I have ever used.

        Man, I cannot even believe this. But then, like I said, the ease of
        just slapping a wp site together has made knowledge of coding,
        and sadly, knowledge of websites in general, a thing that is
        severely lacking.

        I think the table tag was the first thing in html that I learned in
        1997 that made me say, "wow, is that cool." But then, I remember
        I said something similar about blink, frameset,...only the table
        has survived.

        Paul
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        If you were disappointed in your results today, lower your standards tomorrow.

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        • Profile picture of the author Carl Brown
          A ton of people still use tables for web design. A lot of my competitors have table based websites and they outrank me. Tables aren't an issue.
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  • Profile picture of the author nik0
    Banned
    What I read is that it was adviced not to use tables as it's old html and instead use the css to shape that type of things, maybe cause tables load slower? Heck no idea, but I didn't read it only at one place, many places suggested to quit using tables.
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    • Profile picture of the author ttkim
      Originally Posted by nik0 View Post

      What I read is that it was adviced not to use tables as it's old html and instead use the css to shape that type of things, maybe cause tables load slower? Heck no idea, but I didn't read it only at one place, many places suggested to quit using tables.
      No, tables are not "old" html. You don't use tables to design your site (table layouts). You use tables to represent/arrange data.

      Tables are still very relevant.
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      • Profile picture of the author Carl Brown
        Originally Posted by ttkim View Post

        No, tables are not "old" html. You don't use tables to design your site (table layouts). You use tables to represent/arrange data.

        Tables are still very relevant.
        The point is, if google couldn't read data inside tables, table based websites wouldn't rank. They do. There are other reasons to use css based sites, but search engines not being able to read the content of the tables isn't one of them.
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  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    The problem is, even If the <table> tag was obselete Google can't just ignore the tag, half the indexed pages on the net would get ignored, doubtful Google would ever consider doing that.

    As of today (4/22/2013) tables are fine, no big deal.

    Again, it's very easy to prove that Google doesn't have a problem reading plain-text inside a table, look at the Google Cache (text version), the plain-text will be there (guaranteed).

    As long as the major browsers support the <table> tag, I'm pretty sure Google will do the same. In other words, it's not likely the <table> tag is going to be obsolete any time soon.

    BTW, I just now checked the HTML source code of this Warrior Forum thread, most of the forum page is a table. Open the source code for this forum thread page, then do a browser page search for the keyword <table .
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    • Profile picture of the author palms
      From Google.com => View Source...

      "<table id=gbqlt><tr><td id=gbqlw class=gbgt> ... </td></tr></table>"

      I think Google is fine with tables.
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