Can we implement hreflang on root domain for one country and on sub-folder for another country?

Question

Is it possible for 2 countries, we can implement hreflang tags on root domain and a sub-folder, for example for US hreflang on www.example.com and for Italy www.example.com/IT can we do it like this?

I have added both urls in Google search console & submitted separate sitemaps, but Google is counting all pages (including sub-folders) for the main domain, so I am thinking that Google is considering main domain (root domain) as a whole website not a country specific as per hreflang.

If you know about this or have similar experience, then Appreciate your help! Thanks, Adil

Answer 1

Yes, it’s a common way to do it. Here’s an excerpt from Apple’s homepage tags (US, IT):

<link rel="alternate" href="https://www.apple.com/" hreflang="en-US" />
<link rel="alternate" href="https://www.apple.com/it/" hreflang="it-IT" />

Hreflang is a suggestion, not a directive, so Google will still pick what it thinks is the best content. I would try putting the hreflang annotations on a single sitemap (here’s a good generator):

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9" xmlns:xhtml="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
    <url>
        <loc>https://www.example.com/</loc>
        <xhtml:link rel="alternate" hreflang="en-us" href="https://www.example.com/" />
        <xhtml:link rel="alternate" hreflang="it-it" href="https://www.example.com/it" />
    </url>
    <url>
        <loc>https://www.example.com/it</loc>
        <xhtml:link rel="alternate" hreflang="en-us" href="https://www.example.com/" />
        <xhtml:link rel="alternate" hreflang="it-it" href="https://www.example.com/it" />
    </url>
</urlset>

Also, hreflang values apply at the page level—not site or folder level—and are bi-directional. Each page on your site that has an alternate language version should point to itself and the other version(s)—whether you do it through the sitemap, meta tags on each page, or HTTP headers for each page.

Guides:

• Hreflang: The Easy Guide for Beginners has a good overview of how it works.
• hreflang tags implementation guide – How to implement hreflang discusses different ways to get the results you’re after.
• Tell Google about localized versions of your page if you want to hear it from the horse’s mouth.