How do I add nofollow to a link in Webflow?

Add rel nofollow on the link

Add nofollow as a custom attribute on the link. Webflow documents this for a link you do not want crawlers to follow, including a link to a file such as a PDF.

Select the link on the canvas. Open the Element settings panel and go to Custom attributes. Click the plus icon. Type rel in the Name field and nofollow in the Value field. Click out of the modal to save the attribute. Publish the site so the live page includes it.

Example: a resources page links to a PDF rate card. The button can still say "Download the rate card," and the link can still open the file. The extra attribute is rel with the value nofollow. Visitors can use the link. The attribute is a hint to crawlers, not a lock on the file.

Treat nofollow as a hint, not a removal

Webflow states that nofollow is only a suggestion not to follow that link. A search engine may still index the file if it finds the file from another link, on your site or elsewhere. The attribute also does not remove a file that is already in a search index.

Use it when one link should not be an invitation to crawl, such as a direct file link you would rather not have discovered from that page. Do not expect it to hide a URL that is already public, or to change how a normal page ranks. Hiding a whole page from search is a different control (sitemap indexing and noindex), not a rel attribute on one link.

If the same PDF is also linked from a blog post without nofollow, the blog link can still be crawled. Put the attribute on every link that points at the file, or accept that other links remain followable.

A page password does not cover the file address

Files uploaded to the Assets panel or to a Collection field are publicly reachable by their direct address. They are not automatically indexed, but they can be discovered when a public page links to them.

Password protecting the page that contains the link keeps that page from loading for a visitor who does not have the password, so the link is not sitting in public HTML. The file address itself is not password protected. If the page was public first, a crawler may already have stored the file link, and that direct link can still load after you add a password.

Native Webflow password protection is what returns the password page. A custom script that tries to hide the page does not do the same job for crawlers, because crawlers can run without that script. If the file must not be public at all, nofollow is the wrong tool.

Remove an indexed file only through Webflow

Deleting an asset from the Assets panel does not by itself remove it from Webflow's CDN. The old file address can keep working. Nofollow does not change that.

Only a Workspace Owner or Workspace Admin can ask Webflow to remove a file from the CDN. Before you write to support, remove the file from the page, delete it from the Assets panel if that is where it lives, and keep a list of the file addresses. For a file stored on a Collection item, remove or replace it on the item first, then send the same list. After Webflow removes it, the address can return a 404, and search engines can drop it over time.

On a Collection page or in a Collection list, you can bind the attribute value to CMS data. Add rel as the name, click the purple dot in the Value field, and choose a plain text field. Put nofollow in that field only on the items that need it. This binding works on Collection pages and Collection lists, not on a normal static link. For a static page, type nofollow yourself.