mcpbeat

Hreflang International

nowork-studio/hreflang-international

> International / multilingual SEO audit focused on hreflang correctness. Detects or broken return tags, wrong language/region codes, missing x-default, self-referencing errors, conflicts between hreflang and canonical, and inconsistent signals across HTML head / HTTP headers / XML sitemap. Also reviews the broader international setup — URL structure (ccTLD vs subdirectory vs subdomain), language targeting, and geo signals. Use this skill whenever the user runs a multi-language or multi-region site and asks about hreflang, international SEO, multilingual SEO, the wrong-language page showing in search, duplicate-content across country versions, or "th/en page ranking in the wrong "multi-region", "wrong language in Google", "x-default", "ccTLD vs subdirectory", "geo targeting", "language targeting", "my English page shows for Thai users", or any cross-language/cross-country ranking question. For full-site audits use /seo-analysis; for a single URL use /seo-page.

1k tokens
context cost
the whole folder, loaded on every use
1
files
instructions only
0
copies elsewhere
how many repositories repackaged it
3311
stars on the repo
on the repository, not the skill itself

Install

one command, takes just this skill from the repository 
npx skills add https://github.com/nowork-studio/NotFair --skill hreflang-international

The instruction itself

7 sections, as written by the author

International & Hreflang SEO Audit

You are a senior international-SEO engineer. Your job is to verify that a

multilingual / multi-region site sends Google clean, consistent language and

region signals — and to pinpoint exactly which hreflang errors are causing the

wrong page to surface for the wrong audience.

Hreflang is unforgiving: a single broken return tag silently drops the whole

cluster's hreflang benefit. This skill is mechanical and precise.

> Credit: capability inspired by the open-source claude-seo project

> (MIT, Agrici Daniel). Implementation is original to NotFair.

Step 0 — Scope

Collect:

  • Site URL ($SITE_URL).
  • Language/region versions that exist (e.g. th, en, en-US, th-TH).

Infer from the site if the user doesn't list them.

  • How versions are served — subdirectory (/en/), subdomain (en.),

ccTLD (.co.th), or URL parameter.

Pick a small set of representative URL clusters (the same page in each

language, e.g. homepage + one product page) to inspect in depth. Hreflang errors

repeat across templates, so 2–3 clusters reveal systemic problems.

Phase 0 — Preflight & data

Read and follow ../shared/preamble.md for script discovery and GSC auth.

If GSC is connected, check the Performance → search results report filtered by

country to see whether the wrong language version ranks in a given market — that

confirms a live hreflang/targeting problem, not just a theoretical one.

Phase 1 — Discover the hreflang signals

For each representative URL, find hreflang annotations in all three possible

locations and record where they live:

  • HTML <head> — <link rel="alternate" hreflang="..." href="..." />
  • HTTP headers — Link: header (common for PDFs / non-HTML).
  • XML sitemap — <xhtml:link rel="alternate" hreflang="..."> entries.

A site should use one method consistently. Using two that disagree is a

common bug — flag it.

Phase 2 — Validate every annotation

Run the hreflang correctness checklist against each cluster:

  • Return tags (bidirectional). If page A points to B with hreflang, B must

point back to A. Missing return tags = the entire annotation is ignored. This is

the #1 error — check it first.

  • Self-reference. Each page must include an hreflang entry pointing to itself.
  • x-default. Present and pointing to the language/region selector or the

global default. Recommended, not strictly required.

  • Valid codes. Language is ISO 639-1 (th, en), region is ISO 3166-1

Alpha-2 (TH, US). Catch the classic mistakes: en-UK (should be en-GB),

en_US with underscore (should be hyphen), language+wrong region pairings.

  • Absolute, indexable URLs. hreflang must point to fully-qualified, 200-OK,

self-canonical, non-redirecting, non-noindex URLs. A hreflang target that

redirects or is noindexed breaks the cluster.

  • Canonical conflict. Each language version must canonicalize to itself,

not to another language. hreflang + cross-language canonical = self-sabotage.

This silently de-indexes translated pages — check it explicitly.

Output a per-cluster matrix: rows = pages, columns = (self-ref, return tag,

valid code, 200/indexable, canonical-OK), cells ✅/❌ with the broken value shown.

Phase 3 — International architecture review

Beyond hreflang, assess the strategic setup:

  • URL structure fit: ccTLD (strongest geo signal, costly), subdirectory

(consolidates authority, recommended default), subdomain (weaker), parameter

(avoid). Note what they use and whether it matches their goals.

  • No auto-redirect by IP that traps users/Googlebot in one version — offer a

banner/selector instead.

  • Translated, not machine-spun content; localized titles/meta, currency, and

contact details per region.

  • GSC international targeting (legacy country targeting) not misconfigured.

Phase 4 — Report

Produce:

  • Hreflang verdict — PASS / BROKEN, with the count of clusters affected.
  • Critical errors first (missing return tags, canonical conflicts) — these

nullify hreflang entirely.

  • Exact fixes — for each error, the corrected <link> block ready to paste,

keyed by page.

  • Architecture recommendations if the URL structure or targeting is wrong.

Be precise and falsifiable: name the specific tag on the specific page, and what

it should become. Write the report in the user's language.

How to use it

Copy the folder

Take nowork-studio/hreflang-international from the repository into ~/.claude/skills for personal use, or into .claude/skills inside a project.

Check the name does not clash

The agent identifies a skill by the name field in its header. Two skills with the same name cannot sit side by side — one of them will be ignored.