noindex meta tag for posts is not working

Hello,

I apologize for the issue you are facing with the noindex meta tag for your posts. It sounds like you’ve already taken several steps to troubleshoot this problem, which is great.

Here are a few things you can check:

1. Titles & Meta Settings: Ensure that the noindex setting is correctly applied in the Rank Math SEO → Titles & Meta settings. Double-check each section to confirm that the noindex option is selected for the post type you are working with.
   

2. Post Editing Screen: Since you mentioned that index is set in the post editing screen, make sure to change it to noindex there as well. The settings in the post editor can override the global settings in Titles & Meta.

3. Caching Issues: Although you’ve cleared your cache, ensure that there are no server-side caching mechanisms (like Varnish or CDN caching) that might be serving cached versions of your pages.

4. Check for Conflicting Plugins: Even if you didn’t find any conflicts, consider temporarily disabling other plugins to see if the issue persists. Sometimes, certain plugins can interfere with SEO settings.

5. Inspect Source Code: After making changes, inspect the source code of your posts to see if the noindex tag is present. You can do this by right-clicking on the page and selecting "View Page Source" or using developer tools in your browser.

If you’ve checked all these and the issue still persists, please reply to this ticket with your site URL so we can investigate further. A human agent from our support team will take over and assist you more effectively.

Thank you for raising this concern!

Sources:
Fix Excluded by NoIndex Tag – Google Search Console Status » Rank Math
How to Fix Submitted URL Marked ‘NoIndex’ Error » Rank Math

Hello,

Thank you for your patience.

Upon checking the Rank Math routes on your live site, it is getting blocked by your WordFence firewall.

Please refer to the screenshot in the sensitive data section.

In WordFence, you may need to ensure that the Rank Math routes are not getting blocked by the WordFence firewall:

/wp-json/rankmath/v1/updateMeta

Here’s a guide you can follow to whitelist the route:
https://rankmath.com/kb/whitelist-rank-math-in-wordfence/#whitelist-rank-math-in-wordfence

If you’re not using the WordFence plugin, then the firewall must be from your server. If that’s the case, you should get in touch with your web host to whitelist the Rank Math routes.

Looking forward to helping you.

Hello,

The index robots in the Titles & Meta settings act as a default setting only.

This means that it only applies to your new posts; the ones you have updated the robots.txt while editing them will not be affected.

For those that are still set to index, you will have to edit those posts again and update the robots under the Advanced tab.

Looking forward to helping you.