# Prevent a Single Content From Being Indexed

This article will walk you through how to exclude a specific piece of content from being indexed in search engines. To achieve this, you'll need to:

1. Set `noindex` value for `robots` meta tag when adding or editing the content
2. Prevent the content from being added to the XML sitemap

So let's see below how we can achieve this:

### 1. Set `noindex` value for `robots` meta tag when adding or editing the content

1. Navigate to any content for example filter the content page with Basic page
2. Edit a certain basic page
3. From the right hand side look for “Meta tags” section.

![Meta tags section when adding/editing content](/files/-MFQNb-1NpLfb0N3iMbZ)

4\. Open *Meta tags* section and scroll down into the "Advanced" tab.\
5\. Look for "Robots" title, and check on "noindex - Prevents search engines from indexing this page."

![Advanced meta tags when adding/editing content](/files/-MFQNnWJwduJd1BlA7w3)

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### 2. Prevent the content from being added to the XML sitemap

Setting the `noindex` value for `robots` meta tag will prevent search engines from indexing the page. However, the page can still be included in the XML sitemap. This means that you risk getting an error "**Indexed, though blocked by robots.txt**" from the search engine console (.i.e Google Search Console).

To prevent/fix this warning from happening, you'll need to exclude this page from your site's XML sitemap.

1. Navigate to any content for example filter the content page with Basic page
2. Edit a the content you want to exclude from XML sitemap
3. Look for “**Simple XML Sitemap**” and click the item that can be located in the sidebar

![XML sitemap section when adding/editing content](/files/-MDtRdDCwxm6tHQ1w9hl)

&#x20;4\. You will be seeing two options, “Do not index this basic page” or by default, it is selected “Index this”

![](/files/-MDtRllIgGO7NhAHT_mV)

5\. To exclude this page from being indexed please select “**Do not index this Basic page entity in variant Default**”


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# Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation

If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question.

Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter:

```
GET https://docs.varbase.vardot.com/9.0.x/content-designers/search-engine-optimization/excluding-content-from-being-indexed.md?ask=<question>
```

The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language.
The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation.

Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.
