Here’s Our Take On Subdomain vs. Subdirectory: Differences, Examples, Best Practices

According to Google, subdomains and subdirectories are seen as equal when it comes to indexing and ranking. That said, real-world case studies show that subdirectories tend to rank faster and more effectively than subdomains on the first page of the search engine results page (SERPs).

Subdomain vs. Subdirectory

Table of Contents

Helpful summary

Overview: We explain how understanding the difference between subdomains and subdirectories can help businesses increase their traffic, indexing speed, crawling speed, and ultimately revenue. This is crucial for optimizing a website's structure for better search engine performance.

Why you can trust us: Our insights are backed by real-world case studies showing that subdirectories often rank faster and more effectively than subdomains. For instance, Flick reached 9.6M in yearly traffic under 12 months after migrating their content from a subdomain to a subdirectory, coupled with our SEO efforts.

Why this is important: Choosing between subdomains and subdirectories impacts how search engines index and rank website content. Subdirectories are generally favored for consolidating authority and improving SEO performance, which is vital for online business growth.

Action Points: We recommend businesses carefully consider their website structure, preferring subdirectories for integrated content strategy and enhanced SEO benefits.

Further Research: To optimize website structure, businesses should explore the latest SEO trends and tools, and continuously evaluate the impact of their site architecture on search performance.

We compared subdomain and subdirectory

When it comes to search engine optimization (SEO), there’s bound to be disagreement – the complexity of search engines and their algorithms all but guarantee it. Different people interpret data in different ways, and this leads to different responses.

One of the biggest debates in SEO at the moment is between the use of subdomains and subdirectories to organize your website’s hierarchy. In this guide, we’ll be giving you all the information you need to decide for yourself.

Why listen to us?

In the debate of subdomain vs. subdirectory for SEO, Embarque's hands-on experience offers invaluable insights. We've seen firsthand how subdirectories, contrary to some opinions, can enhance SEO more effectively than subdomains. 

This is evidenced by case studies like World First and HotPads, where shifting from subdomains to subdirectories led to significant increases in organic traffic. Our expertise helps small businesses make informed decisions on website structure to maximize their SEO potential.

Subdomain vs. subdirectory: Summary

According to Google, subdomains and subdirectories are seen as equal when it comes to indexing and ranking. That said, real-world case studies show that subdirectories tend to rank faster and more effectively than subdomains on the first page of the search engine results page (SERPs).

What is a subdomain?

A subdomain is like a domain extension or alternative name for a site that lives under the same domain as your main site. An example of this can be seen on many e-commerce websites which have their shop or marketplace located at a separate URL from their normal website. In these cases, the shop or marketplace URL ends up being a subdomain, such as:

A subdomain is another domain, or top-level domain (TLD), that exists within the main site. If you have a blog on WordPress, for instance, it’s sometimes located at an address like this:

In this example, blog is the subdomain to .example – the main domain of the URL.

Additionally, a subdomain is a type of website hierarchy that operates under a root directory. Unlike the use of folders in organizing content on a website, a subdomain acts as its own website.

Although it’s associated with the root directory, it often has its own content management system, design template, analytics tools, and other unique features.

Why would you use a subdomain?

In practice, subdomains are typically used to create _logical distinctions _between two related web resources. What determines a logical distinction? That’s largely a matter of personal choice.

There are a number of reasons that a business might decide to segment one part of its operations from another through the use of a subdomain. While we can’t list them all, here are a few common reasons that subdomains get used.

Content

One common use of subdomains is in sites where the content is too diverse to be contained under the main domain. Take the New York Times, for example. They operate the main domain at nytimes.com for all the news articles and profiles you’d expect to find on the New York Times’ website.

However, they also operate a subdomain at cooking.nytimes.com where you can find all the delicious recipes they feature in the paper.

Someone at the New York Times decided that recipes were far enough removed from their standard content that they warranted the creation of a dedicated subdomain to organize them.

Branding

A subdomain structure can also help in situations where different parts of your website need markedly different branding than you typically use.

Subdomains are essentially distinct sites. That means that you’re free to change up the look and feel of the site without changing anything on your main site.

Going back to the New York Times example, there are some pretty clear differences between the main site and the cooking subdomain site.

New York Times

New York Times Cooking

Clean organization

Sometimes, businesses choose to use subdomains for the simple fact that they need to limit the complexity of their website hierarchies. According to Kissmetrics, keeping the number of website directories between two and seven is ideal for organization and content crawling, and using subdomains is a viable way to achieve this.

Take Google, for example. The insane variety and complexity of the services Google offers means that using subdomains is a powerful organizational tool in their arsenal – which they frequently use. Here are some examples:

If Google tried to organize each of these services under a single, main domain, the complexity of the site hierarchy would make it almost impossible to troubleshoot or manage.

Privacy

Subdomains are also beneficial if you want to offer different privacy options for different parts of your site, or if the content on your site is only accessible after login. Since subdomains are completely separate sites, it’s possible to use an entirely different privacy policy, directory structure and access requirements for each subdomain.

Many start-ups are choosing to host a landing page for their product at a root domain and the product itself at a subdomain. For example, one of our clients, Flick, uses a subdomain for their SaaS app:

Targeting different regions

If you want to target different countries or regions, you can use subdomains to create separate pages for each of your locations, for example, us.example.com and uk.example.com. This gives you the opportunity to tailor your content and design to different audiences.

Separating e-commerce stores

By separating your e-commerce store from your website with a subdomain like shop.example.com, you can simplify the user experience for users who are only interested in purchasing products.

What is a subdirectory?

A subdirectory, or subfolder, is a directory that exists inside another directory. For instance, you might have the main directory www.example.com. Within that main directory, you might have the subdirectory /blog. Shown with the main directory, it would look like:

Subdirectories are subsets of pages on your main website. They’re essentially just subsections of your website that exist at their unique URLs within your site. For example, if you had a large e-commerce store with three top-level navigation categories – clothing, home improvement and automotive parts – you might create corresponding subdirectories for each type of product: /apparel, /homeimprovement, and /automotive.

As we can see from the above, subdirectories (also known as subfolders) boast a type of file structure or hierarchy that organizes and categorizes content within a website, making it easier for users to find what they’re looking for.

To illustrate, a website may have one subdirectory for images, another for videos, and another for articles. Each of these might have its own set of related files and subdirectories (e.g., www.example.com/articles/guides).

Why would you use a subdirectory?

Hosting content under subdirectories enhances the authority and relevance of your main domain in multiple ways, leading to improved search visibility and rankings for your website as a whole. 

So, not only does this result in a better user experience, but it increases credibility and trust in the eyes of search engines. Let’s look at several reasons why you might choose to use a subdirectory for your website.

Focus on one single domain

Managing several different domains and subdomains can be a tedious exercise. Not only do you have to make sure that the subdomains look different from one another to avoid confusion, but you also need to regularly update all of them with fresh content. Subdirectories are perfect for startups that don’t produce different types of content and need to focus on agility and execution.

Easier website tracking

If you’re using Google Analytics, you won’t need to go through different websites using subfolders, as all the pages are located under one root domain. This can allow you to save time and energy when tracking your website traffic and conversions.

Subdirectories also make it easier to track the performance of your content—both how they perform individually and how they contribute to the overall success of your website. This is particularly helpful if your site hosts lots of content, as subdirectories provide a way to track which topics drive the most engagement.

Subdirectories also provide a more structured way of tracking visitor behavior on your website. For example, if you have one subdirectory for your FAQs and another for your product pages, you can use website and content analytics to track the number of visitors to each subdirectory.

Simplicity

Finally, using subfolders provides a streamlined approach to online content creation. This can be beneficial for startups that do not have to produce very different types of content or web pages. At the same time, it can also be easier to update the website with fresh content, as we’ve mentioned before. As we will explore in the next sections, a regularly updated website with a strong internal linking structure is important for SEO, and can help your domain rank faster.

It’s also worth mentioning that subdirectories make large websites easier to navigate and manage. Their hierarchical framework helps you maintain a clear and logical URL structure, streamlining user journeys and improving user experience on your site. 

Organizing related content into subfolders isn’t just convenient for users, though. The intuitive order of subdirectories has the added benefit of increasing website performance, too. Loading speeds are increased, ultimately providing a more satisfying experience.

Intuitive URL structure

Subdirectories help create a clear and simple URL structure, making it easier for users to understand and remember the location of specific pages on your website. This clear chain opens the doors for search engines to crawl a website and index its content, leading to improved SERP rankings and visibility—but more on that later!

Organizing related content within a website

If your website has multiple sections, each with its own set of content, using subdirectories to organize the information can help keep your site structure clean and easy to navigate:

Differences between subdomains and subdirectories

A subdomain is essentially a separate website that’s hosted on a different domain than the main website. A subdirectory is a subfolder within the main website’s domain. 

With that in mind, let’s delve into the main differences between the two:

  1. URL structure: a subdomain URL might look like “subdomain.example.com”, while a subdirectory URL would look like “example.com/subdirectory”.
  2. IP address: Subdomains often have a different IP address than the main domain, which means they can be hosted on a separate server. This can impact a website's load time, security, and overall performance.
  3. Indexing and ranking: Search engines treat subdomains and subdirectories differently when it comes to indexing and ranking. Subdomains may be treated as separate websites by search engines, while subdirectories are considered part of the main website. 

Which does Google prefer?

Search engines are constantly evolving. That makes it pretty difficult to determine the various nuances of their ranking algorithms with 100% certainty. Not to mention the fact that many search engines consider a huge variety of different ranking factors when it comes to indexing a webpage.

According to Google itself, both subdomains and subcategories are seen as equal in the eyes of its indexing and content crawling algorithms. You can hear it straight from the horse (in this case, John Mueller’s) mouth in this episode of Google’s SEO Snippets.

Theoretically, that means Google should give equal index rank blog.example.com and* example.com/blog*. That’s great news from an SEO perspective as it allows for personal preference to be the main determinant in the subdomain – subdirectory debate…. right?

Well, maybe not. Data from the SEO trenches show seems to contradict the official line from Google across the board. Here are three cases that tell a vastly different story:

World First

International payment service World First released data from an experiment they conducted on the respective indexing power of subdomains and subdirectories. The setup was simple: they moved their blog from blog.worldfirst.com _to _worldfirst.com/blog.

While the specific growth figures aren’t included for privacy reasons, the change resulted in a ton of new organic traffic to the site as you can see from the handy graph they posted.

HotPads

HotPads is a map-based rentals marketplace that – like World First – used to publish its blog to a subdomain. The site was reorganized and the blog was moved from blog.hotpads.com to a subdirectory on the main site: hotpads.com/blog. The organic traffic growth that resulted – represented by the chart below – is pretty striking.

IWantMyName

IWantMyName is a domain registrar that uses a blog to drive organic traffic to its site. Back in 2014, they ran the opposite experiment as the businesses above. Instead of moving their blog from a subdomain to a subdirectory, they moved it from a subdirectory to a subdomain. The result? A 47% decrease in organic traffic.

It seems that Google’s assurances should be taken with a grain of salt on this occasion.

Subdomains or subdirectories for better SEO?

According to Google, they treat subdomains and subdirectories similarly for crawling, indexing, and ranking purposes. However, the majority of SEO agencies and experts, including us at Embarque, often present contrasting viewpoints.

Subdomains

Subdirectories

While Google may treat subdomains and subdirectories similarly, we often observe better performance and manageability with subdirectories. Subdomains have their place, particularly for distinct sub-brands, independent products, or content not needing search engine indexing (e.g., internal portals or landing pages)​​.

However, at the end of the day, the choice between using subdomains or subdirectories should be based on your website's unique structure, objectives, and the nature of the content you host.

Why are subdirectories better for SEO?

Despite Google’s assurances that both subdomains and subdirectories are treated the same if you look at the way Google has been favoring subdirectories in its search rankings over the past 3 years it certainly appears as though having a single directory with all your content is going to give you the best results when it comes to ranking your site.

There are a few possible reasons as to why:

Keyword dilution

Google favors subdirectories because they allow for keywords to be indexed more easily. Since subdomains are distinct from their root domains, keywords contained within both rank separately from one another. This means that a subdomain is unable to help a root domain rank for a specific keyword search and visa versa.

Backlink dilution

The ranking power of subdomains is also affected by backlink dilution. This phenomenon refers to the fact that a backlink that points back to a subdomain will not affect the root domain in any way.

Say you run a website – example.com – and decide you want to host a blog at blog.example.com to drive traffic to your site. The SEO issue lies in the fact that any backlinks that your fantastic blog content manages to attract will do nothing for the index ranking of your main sight in the eyes of Google’s algorithm.

Internal linking

Google has said that it prefers sites with strong internal linking to those, which use multiple domains or subdomains in the past. The clear winner in terms of SEO is using a single domain or subdirectory as opposed to using multiple domains and therefore having to spread out your content across different locations (such as separate domains for blogs, services, and landing pages).

International website implementation

International websites are typically structured using one of three methods: country code top-level domains (ccTLDs), subdirectories, or subdomains. While ccTLDs are not ideal as a website's global SEO potential is restricted, subdomains fare no better. 

The growing trend among brands is to use subdirectory structures for their international websites. With a subdirectory approach, all international versions of a website can be managed from a single content management system, making it easier to maintain consistency and control.

Best practices for subdirectories

When you opt for subdirectories in your website structure, you're keeping all your content under the main domain. This unity can strengthen your site's SEO, but it also requires careful management. 

Here are some best practices to ensure your subdirectories are effectively contributing to your SEO goals:

1. Maintain a logical structure

Organize your subdirectories in a way that makes sense both for users and for search engines. For example, if you have a blog, a store, and a contact page, your URLs might look like: www.example.com/blog, www.example.com/store, and www.example.com/contact. This logical structure helps users navigate your site and enables search engines to better understand and index your content.

2. Utilize clear and descriptive URLs

Create subdirectory paths that are intuitive and descriptive of the content they contain. Avoid long and complicated URLs, and use hyphens to separate words. For instance, use www.example.com/womens-dresses instead of www.example.com/category123/prod456.

3. Consolidate link equity

Take advantage of the fact that subdirectories inherit the main domain's authority. Encourage internal linking within your content to spread the link equity throughout your subdirectories, boosting the SEO potential of individual pages and the domain as a whole.

4. Streamline content management

With all content living under the same domain, it's easier to manage updates and ensure consistency across your site. Regularly refresh your subdirectories with new and relevant content to keep users engaged and search engines interested.

5. Optimize for site speed

Subdirectories can benefit from the main domain's performance optimizations. Ensure that your entire site, including each subdirectory, loads quickly to provide a good user experience and meet search engine criteria for site speed.

6. Simplify analytics tracking

When using subdirectories, you can track the performance of your entire site through a single Google Analytics property. This unified view makes it easier to analyze user behavior and content performance across different sections.

7. Accurate sitemap and navigation

Keep your XML sitemap up to date with all subdirectory pages to aid search engines in crawling your site. Additionally, ensure that your website's navigation menu clearly reflects the subdirectory structure to aid users in finding what they need.

8. Leverage subdirectory-specific meta tags

Use meta tags like titles and descriptions to their full potential for each subdirectory page. Tailor these tags to the specific content of each subdirectory to improve click-through rates from search results.

9. Focus on comprehensive internal linking

Develop a robust internal linking strategy that interconnects content within subdirectories. This not only helps users explore more of your site but also allows search engine crawlers to find and index more pages.

For instance, we were able to achieve a 60+ Domain Rating (DR) and 9.6 million yearly organic search traffic with Flick by doing the following:

10. Use breadcrumbs for enhanced UX

Breadcrumbs are a navigational aid that shows users their path from the home page to their current location. Implementing breadcrumbs can enhance user experience and help search engines understand the structure of your site.

Where does that leave us?

The subdomain versus subdirectory debate has been raging on for years. Opinions are strong, with proponents for each side arguing that their choice is better. According to Google, both choices are equal in terms of SEO. However, as we’ve seen today that doesn’t seem to be the case. Sure, one-day search engines will have the power to connect subdomains back to their roots. For now, they don’t.

Subdirectories allow search engines to crawl through all your content and attribute it to one source. This is a massive benefit to SEO and makes subdirectories a strong choice for small to medium-sized websites and businesses.

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