Noindex & Nofollow

Noindex is a directive telling search engines not to include a page in search results; nofollow tells them not to pass ranking credit through a specific link.

These are two independent settings people often conflate. A page can be noindex (won't appear in search) but still followed (its outbound links still pass link equity), or the reverse. Nofollow on outbound links is commonly applied to user-generated content, paid/sponsored links (a Google Search Essentials requirement for disclosed paid links), and low-trust external destinations.