Internal Link Equity Calculator

The ranking value a page passes through its links. Each page passes a damped share of what it holds, split between its outbound links, so a page with many links passes less through each one.

Geometrically. Each level divides a page's share by roughly the number of links on the page above it, so a page five clicks deep on a site with 25 links a page receives a vanishing fraction of what the homepage holds.

No, and this is the finding that surprises people. What costs equity is the total link slots on the path, not the hop count — 200 links over two hops dilutes more per page than 25 links over three.

The share of a page's value that flows onward rather than being retained, set at 0.85 in the original PageRank paper. It remains a reasonable default and it is an input here because nobody outside the search engines knows the real figure.

Enough to be useful and few enough that each carries weight. The old hard limit is long gone; the trade is real, since doubling the links halves what each one passes.

Link to them directly from pages that hold a lot — the homepage, major hubs, high-traffic articles. A single link from a strong page beats several from weak ones, exactly as with external links.

It is a simplified flow model of the same idea, and deliberately a worst case: each page here receives from a single parent, where real sites link to a page from many places. Use the ratio, never the absolute figures.

A page with no internal links pointing at it. It receives no equity, is discovered late if at all, and is one of the most common causes of pages sitting unindexed on otherwise healthy sites.

The usual guidance is that important pages should be within three clicks of the homepage. What actually matters is total link slots on the path — three clicks through pages carrying 200 links each is worse than four through pages carrying 20.

Evidence suggests in-content links carry more weight, and site-wide navigation links are discounted for appearing everywhere. This model treats them equally, which is another reason to read the ratio rather than the numbers.

No. Sculpting internal equity with nofollow stopped working many years ago — the value is deducted whether or not the link passes it, so the practice loses equity rather than redirecting it.

A page that collects and links to many related pages, giving them a shorter path from the homepage. It is the standard fix for depth and it works because it shortens paths for a whole set at once.