# Category page

Category: [E-Commerce SEO](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/category/e-commerce-seo/) › [Shop pages & navigation](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/category/e-commerce-seo/shop-pages-navigation/) · Also known as: product category page, product listing page

A **category page** in e-commerce is a page that groups related products under one URL and leads visitors to the product detail pages. Blogs and CMS platforms also use categories; this entry covers online shops.

## What does a category page contain?

Baymard describes intermediary category pages, which show subcategories instead of products, and hybrid pages, which put subcategory tiles above the product grid. Which design fits depends on how many products and subcategories a shop has.

A listing with many products is split into several pages. Google's pagination guidance says:

- Each page of the list gets its own URL, for example with `?page=2`.
- Each page has its own canonical URL instead of pointing to page 1.
- Google ignores fragment identifiers, so page numbers should not be set with `#`.
- The next page is offered with a normal `<a href>` link. Google no longer uses `rel="next"` and `rel="prev"`.
- For "load more" or infinite scroll, the following content needs another crawlable path.

## Example

```html
<!-- https://www.example.com/running-shoes/?page=2 -->
<link rel="canonical" href="https://www.example.com/running-shoes/?page=2">
<a href="https://www.example.com/running-shoes/?page=3">Next</a>
```

## Related terms

- [Product detail page (PDP)](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/product-detail-page/index.md)
- [E-commerce SEO](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/e-commerce-seo/index.md)
- [Pagination](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/pagination/index.md)
- [Faceted navigation](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/faceted-navigation/index.md)
- [Internal linking](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/internal-linking/index.md)
- [Canonical tag](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/canonical-tag/index.md)

## Sources

- [Pagination and incremental page loading – Google Search Central](https://developers.google.com/search/docs/specialty/ecommerce/pagination-and-incremental-page-loading)
- [Consider providing intermediary category pages – Baymard Institute (secondary)](https://baymard.com/blog/ecommerce-sub-category-pages)
- [Managing crawling of faceted navigation URLs – Google Search Central](https://developers.google.com/crawling/docs/faceted-navigation)

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Last updated: October 7, 2026
URL: https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/category-page/