Query String (URL Parameters)

Query string, sometimes also URL parameters, is a specific part of the URL that contains query parameters

The difference between “URL parameters” and “query string” is primarily technical: URL parameters are the individual key-value pairs within the query string, but the terms are often used interchangeably.

To be precise, then, query string is the section of a URL that follows the query symbol “?” and can include one or more URL parameters: it is used to pass data to the web page and to dynamically change the content or behavior of the page based on this data. For example, in an e-commerce site a query string can be used to filter products by color, size or price.

URL parameters, on the other hand, are as mentioned key-value pairs added to the URL of a web page to track and personalize the user experience or to modify the content displayed. They appear at the end of the URL after the query symbol “?” and are separated by “&” when more than one parameter is present. For instance, in www.example.com/page?parameter1=value1&parameter2=value2, “parameter1” and “parameter2” are the keys, while “value1” and “value2” are their corresponding values. URL parameters are often used to track traffic sources, to manage user sessions, to filter or sort content on a page, and for other dynamic functions.

Query strings can pose a challenge for SEO, asa mishandling can, for example, lead to duplicate content creation-if several variants of a URL lead to the same page-cause dilution of link equity if there are too many variants, or confuse crawlers with respect to the version of the page to be indexed. To overcome this issue, you can use the canonical tag to communicate the preferred page version, the robots.txt file to block crawling of certain parameters, or the settings for URL parameters available in Google Search Console.