Is IP Canonicalization Important for SEO?

Last Updated: 2 years ago by BrodNeil

What is an IP?

An IP address is unique identifier/locator  designed to allow one computer or digital device to communicate with another computer or digital device. Communication is done via the Internet.

IP stands for Internet Protocol and computers have IP addresses to communicate with each other over the Internet.  Therefore an IP address can mean Internet Protocol address.

What is Canonicalization?

Canonicalization is the process  of selecting a website url for you to use.

Examples of URLs on this domain:

• www.brodneil.com
• brodneil.com
• brodneil.com/index.php

Canonicalization helps your your browser choose which URL to use.

We decided to use https://www.brodneil.com for this domain.

What is an IP Canonicalization?

This is the process of redirecting your IP address to the main domain name it is being hosted.  Note that this is particularly for dedicated IP addresses, not shared IP addresses, of your website.

Is IP Canonicalization important for SEO?

There are quite a number of SEO specialists and SEO software that takes IP canonicalization as a very important factor in SEO.

Let me make it clear that I value URL canonicalization for SEO. See Canonical Tags: https://moz.com/learn/seo/canonicalization

However, for IP canonicalization, this might not make a lot of difference.  If you want to set it, you can do it though.

One reason they are setting IP canonicalization is to avoid duplicate content. Let us remember though that Your IP address is a unique locator and your website needs it for it to be located.  Here is a good read for you to ponder: https://moz.com/community/q/how-to-do-ip-canonicalization.

Nevertheless, if you really like to set it up, you might find this helpful:

Canonicalize Your IP Address: How to set it up?

1. Open and edit your .htaccess file.  This can be done via FTP or CPanel > file manager .
2. Make sure to back up before you edit your .htaccess.
3. Use the code below these steps to set your IP canonicalization.
4. Replace xxx\.xxx\.xxx\.xxx with your website’s dedicated IP address.
5. Replace example.com with your actual domain name.
6. Save your .htaccess and check the changes using a private browser pulling up your website using the IP address.

Code:
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^xxx\.xxx\.xxx\.xxx [nc,or]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^example\.com [nc]
RewriteRule (.*) https://www.example.com/$1 [R=301,L]


If you have time, I would really appreciate your thoughts to help this post better for everyone to benefit. Thanks.