Definition
Hreflang conflicts are the common implementation errors that stop hreflang annotations from working: missing return tags (page A points to page B, but B does not point back to A), pointing to URLs that redirect or return errors, mixing hreflang with conflicting canonical tags (a localised page that canonicalises to a different-language version), inconsistent or invalid language and region codes, listing non-crawlable or noindexed URLs, and different pages in the same set disagreeing about the mapping.
When hreflang is broken, search engines fall back to their own judgement about which version to show in which market, so the wrong language can be served, versions can compete with each other, and the effort of building localised content is partly wasted. Because hreflang is reciprocal and set-wide, one inconsistent page can undermine the whole cluster.
In context
For a bilingual iGaming glossary with EN and RU versions, hreflang correctness is what keeps the two from competing and ensures each audience gets its own language. The requirements: every term page in one language points to its exact counterpart in the other and vice versa (reciprocal), the counterpart URLs are live 200-status indexable pages (not redirects or noindexed), each page's canonical points to itself and not to the other language, the language codes are valid, and if a default is needed an x-default is set consistently.
The EN and RU pages should be genuine counterparts covering the same concept, not loosely related pages.
Validation is straightforward and worth doing after any structural change: a crawl that checks reciprocal hreflang and flags canonical/hreflang conflicts, plus the Search Console international-targeting and page-indexing reports. Typical failure modes in this kind of project are a newly added term that exists in EN but not yet in RU (so the EN page points to a missing RU URL), a template that emits a canonical to the EN version on RU pages, or a trailing-slash or protocol mismatch between the hreflang URL and the actual live URL.
Each of these silently degrades the localisation, so hreflang checks belong in the release routine for the glossary, not just an initial setup step.
Worked example
After adding 40 new English glossary terms before their Russian versions, an affiliate's crawl flags 40 hreflang errors - EN pages pointing to not-yet-existing RU URLs. The team suppresses hreflang for terms until both language versions are live, adds a release check for reciprocal hreflang and self-canonical, and the international-targeting report clears.
Related terms
Frequently asked questions
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