SEO glossary
rel=sponsored
The rel="sponsored" attribute on a link tells search engines you were paid for it — through advertising, sponsorship or an affiliate agreement.
It exists so you can accept money for a link without it counting as a vote. Google introduced it in 2019 alongside rel="ugc", and the three attributes can be combined on one link — rel="sponsored nofollow" is valid and common.
The stakes are asymmetric, which is the part worth remembering. Choosing sponsored when ugc would have been marginally better costs you nothing. Leaving a paid link with no attribute at all is a link scheme by Google's own written definition, and that is the version with a penalty attached — for the site selling the link as well as the one buying it.
Affiliate links count. Every Amazon tag, every tracked partner URL, every discount-code link that earns a commission is a paid link, and the attribute belongs on all of them. Most affiliate plugins can add it site-wide, which is the only maintainable way to do it.
Common question
- Is rel=sponsored or rel=nofollow correct for affiliate links?
- Either is accepted and `sponsored` is more precise, so prefer it. What matters is that one of them is present — an unmarked affiliate link is the actual problem.
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