Link building glossary

Anchor text

Anchor text is the visible, clickable text of a hyperlink. Google uses it to understand what the linked page is about and recommends anchor text that is descriptive, reasonably concise and relevant to both pages. For an image used as a link, Google reads the image's alt attribute as the anchor text.

Reviewed by Gareth Hoyle, Managing Director
Last reviewed 31 October 2026

What does Google say about anchor text?

Google's link best practices say good anchor text makes sense on its own, so a reader can tell what is behind the link without the surrounding sentence. It advises against generic text such as 'click here', against long anchors that run to a full sentence, and against chaining several links next to each other. On keywords, it says that if it feels like you're forcing keywords into the anchor text, then it's probably too much.

If a link has no text, Google can fall back on the link's title attribute. Anchor text inserted with JavaScript should be checked in the rendered HTML with the URL Inspection tool.

What types of anchor text are there?

SEO tools usually group the anchors pointing to a site into a few types.

Branded: the company or product name, such as Marketing Signals
Naked URL: the address itself, such as marketingsignals.com
Descriptive: a phrase that summarises the page, such as 'guide to SaaS link building'
Exact match: the precise keyword the page targets
Generic: 'read more', 'this article' or 'here'
Image: the alt text of a linked image

Why over-optimised anchors are a risk

Google's spam policies list links with optimised anchor text in articles, guest posts or press releases distributed on other sites as an example of link spam, along with forum signatures stuffed with keyword links. Its 2017 warning on article campaigns named stuffing keyword-rich links in articles as a sign of a link scheme. Links that publishers choose freely tend to use brand names, URLs and plain descriptions, so a profile dominated by one commercial phrase looks arranged.

Example

Of 40 sites linking to a Leeds builder's loft conversion page, a natural mix might include the firm's name, its URL and phrases like 'this loft conversion cost guide'. If 30 of the 40 used the exact words 'cheap loft conversions Leeds', the pattern would suggest the links were placed rather than given.