What are Meta Keywords?
Meta keywords are a collection of specific terms included within a webpage’s HTML source code to assist search engines in identifying the topic and focus of the page.
These keywords are not displayed on the actual webpage but are embedded in the backend HTML for SEO-related purposes.
Anyone interested in viewing the meta keywords of a webpage can do so by inspecting the page’s HTML source code.
However, the importance of meta keywords has significantly declined over time, as modern search engines now prioritize more advanced ranking signals.
What is their format?
Meta keywords are inserted in the <head> section of an HTML document. Their typical syntax appears as follows:
<meta name="keywords" content="keyword1, keyword2, keyword3">For instance, if your target topics include areas of digital marketing, the meta tag might be:
<meta name="keywords" content="digital marketing, SEO, online advertising">To inspect the meta keywords of a page, users can press Ctrl+U or right-click anywhere on the page and choose "View page source" to open the HTML code.
Historical overview of meta keywords
In 2002, Danny Sullivan published a well-known article titled “Death of A Meta Tag”, which outlined the rise and fall of the meta keywords tag in SEO history.
Before Google's dominance, early search engines like AltaVista and Infoseek heavily relied on meta keywords to assess a page’s relevance to search queries.
Web developers frequently stuffed their HTML headers with many keywords to improve rankings in these engines.
As platforms like Inktomi and Lycos also adopted this tagging practice, the use of meta keywords became widespread in early SEO strategies.
But by 1997, excessive and manipulative use of meta keywords began to be flagged as spammy behavior.
With the progression of search technology and more refined algorithms, search engines gradually moved away from relying on meta keywords.
Today, these tags hold little to no influence on how pages rank in modern search engines.
Are they useful?
There is some debate among SEO professionals about whether meta keywords serve any real purpose today.
While some believe they offer slight SEO benefits, others argue that they are largely obsolete and offer no measurable impact on rankings.
In some cases, their effectiveness may depend on the specific search engine, as each one may treat these tags differently.
What does Google think about them?
Google does not consider meta keywords to be relevant and does not factor them into its ranking algorithm. In fact, Google has openly stated that it completely disregards the keywords meta tag.
“Our web search (the well-known search at Google.com that hundreds of millions of people use each day) disregards keywords meta tag completely. They simply don't have any effect in our search ranking at present.”
Meta keywords have never been a part of Google’s ranking signals. So, for those optimizing websites primarily for Google, investing time in meta keywords offers no value.
Why does Google not approve of them?
Historically, site owners began overusing keyword tags in attempts to manipulate rankings.
This led to widespread keyword stuffing, where irrelevant or misleading terms were crammed into the meta keywords field.
Because of this abuse, Google chose to completely ignore meta keyword tags in its ranking systems.
Google also noted:
“It’s possible that Google could use this information in the future, but it’s unlikely. Google has ignored the keywords meta tag for years and currently we see no need to change that policy.”
Google Search Appliance considers meta keywords
The Google Search Appliance was a hardware-based search solution offered by Google that allowed organizations to incorporate Google-powered search within their internal systems.
This enterprise-level product, which was discontinued in 2016, supported the use of meta tags including meta keywords for internal indexing purposes.
However, it had no relationship to Google's main public search engine, and Google Search Central confirms that meta keywords are irrelevant to Google.com rankings.
What do other search engines think about them?
Yandex
Yandex, the dominant search engine in Russia, has mentioned that meta keywords may help determine a page's relevance, though it assigns very low weight to them in its ranking algorithm.
Baidu
In 2018, a Chinese SEO expert highlighted that Baidu had stopped factoring in meta keywords for ranking purposes since 2012, citing an engineer's forum post.
Despite this, some SEO professionals believe that Baidu still considers meta keywords in a minor capacity, especially after Baidu stated in 2020 that title, description, and keywords are used to assess page value.
Bing
Microsoft's Bing called meta keywords “dead in terms of SEO value” back in 2014.
Earlier in 2011, Bing warned that the tag might even signal spammy content.
In 2020, Microsoft’s Christi Olsen confirmed on Twitter that Bing fully ignores meta keywords in its ranking systems.
Naver
South Korea’s largest search engine, Naver, does not refer to meta keywords in its documentation. This indicates that it does not place value on these tags either.
Conclusion
As far as Google and most major search engines are concerned, meta keywords do not contribute to improving SEO rankings.
While some engines may treat them as a minor signal for relevance, none consider them influential for actual ranking positions.
That said, meta keywords can still be useful for detecting low-quality content—particularly in identifying pages that engage in keyword stuffing or copying others’ keyword tags.