rel=next & Serious Chrome Prerender Bug

[levo]

If you have followed Google's recommendation and implemented rel=next for your paginated links, or if you're using rel=prerender to speed things up; Chrome 25.x and 26.x (beta) has a serious bug.

Lets say someone searched for your page on Google and the first link is your website. Chrome prerenders it. (Note that you can't prevent prerendering, Chrome no longer sends any specific headers)

And if you have next/prerender link in header to another page, even if the visitor doesn't visit the page or visits other pages even from other websites, Chrome keeps prerendering the next page and the next page from your site.

As long as the user keeps the window open, Chrome keeps prerendering.

It starts to happen if the user doesn't visit the prerendered page and goes to another url. Once it starts, it prerenders the next page every 30 seconds. (I think it happens when Chrome tries to evict the preprendered page)

Google Analytics or other stats that have implemented Page Visibility API doesn't record it. But others, like Adsense, record the impressions.

[dstiles]

> Chrome prerenders it. (Note that you can't prevent prerendering, Chrome no longer sends any specific headers)

Do you mean this replaces G's webpreview or is it (as I read it) an automated chrome-only feature which ALWAYS happens if G returns mt website? Surely if the latter then some sites would be getting hits from G continually.

I have never added pre/next to site headers so hopefully only the first hit should happen, but even that is one too many if I understand it correctly. :(

[MikeLevin]

Yes, it is likely on every search impression. I was hit with this. I knew my personal site couldn't be spiking up to 12K/day all of the sudden. It doesn't show in Google Analytics or HitTail, but it does show in WordPress JetPack. Here's a pic of my report. I was getting very close to pulling my weblogs from my host to go over them by hand until I read this. I'm using rel=prerender.

[edited by: goodroi at 5:57 pm (utc) on Feb 28, 2013]
[edit reason] Please no links to personal blogs [/edit]

[levo]

One mistake in the first post, Firefox prefetches rel=next, not Chrome. I've been using rel="next prerender"

or is it (as I read it) an automated chrome-only feature which ALWAYS happens if G returns mt website?

Since mid-2011, Chrome prerenders the first result in Google SERPs almost all the time. It creates a hit on your webserver and some other stats like Adsense.

[googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com...]

And if you have rel=prerender implemented for a series of pages, latest Chrome follows each prerender link in the background, creating hundreds of impressions.

[dstiles]

Firefox and some other browsers issue a prefetch header, so I block those (without blocking any subsequent non-prefetch). If chrome follows the same rules I'm not concerned, but if this is a forced entry I may consider blocking all chrome UAs with a warning as to why.

There is no way I'm going to put prerender codes on my sites.

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

Loading up my page without a real visitor is against my terms of use policy, it's bot behavior.

[dstiles]

Same here, but enforcing it is another matter. :)