## 🗺️ Overview

SearchAtlas gives you precise control over which URLs appear in your dashboards and reports. Using the **URL Exclusion Conditions** feature inside OTTO Settings, you can filter out URLs that are not relevant to your SEO analysis — such as thank-you pages, admin paths, or staging URLs. Additionally, SearchAtlas treats subdomains as separate projects by default, which is important to understand when reviewing your data.



## ⚙️ Where to Find URL Exclusion Conditions

1. Log in to your SearchAtlas account.
2. Navigate to **OTTO Settings** from the left-hand sidebar.
3. Select the project you want to configure.
4. Scroll to the **URL Exclusion Conditions** section.
5. Click **Add Condition** to begin entering your exclusion rules.

## ✍️ How to Write URL Exclusion Patterns

URL exclusion conditions use a **wildcard syntax** based on the asterisk character (**\***). The asterisk matches any sequence of characters within a URL segment. This allows you to write flexible rules that catch multiple URL variations with a single pattern.

Use the following format when entering patterns:

- **Exact path exclusion:** Enter the full path, for example **/thank-you**, to exclude that specific page.
- **Wildcard prefix match:** Use **/blog/\*** to exclude all URLs that begin with **/blog/**, such as **/blog/post-1** and **/blog/category/news**.
- **Wildcard suffix match:** Use **\*?ref=email** to exclude any URL containing that query string parameter, regardless of the path.
- **Full wildcard:** Use **\*/admin/\*** to exclude any URL that contains **/admin/** anywhere in the path.
- **File type exclusion:** Use **\*.pdf** to exclude all URLs ending in **.pdf** across your entire domain.

Patterns are matched against the full URL path and query string. Matching is **not** case-sensitive, so **/Contact** and **/contact** are treated identically.



## 📋 Common Exclusion Pattern Examples

- **/cart** — Excludes the shopping cart page only.
- **/checkout/\*** — Excludes all checkout step pages.
- **\*?sessionid=\*** — Excludes URLs with dynamic session ID parameters.
- **/wp-admin/\*** — Excludes all WordPress admin URLs.
- **\*/print/\*** — Excludes print-version pages anywhere on the site.
- **\*.jpg** — Excludes direct links to image files.

## 💾 Saving and Applying Your Exclusions

1. After entering each pattern, click **Add** to confirm the rule.
2. Repeat for each additional pattern you want to exclude.
3. When all patterns are entered, click **Save Settings**.
4. SearchAtlas will apply your exclusion rules to new data going forward. Historical data already processed may require a **recrawl** to reflect the updated exclusions — use the **Recrawl** option within your project settings if needed.

## 🌐 How Subdomains Are Handled in SearchAtlas

By default, SearchAtlas treats each subdomain as a **separate, independent project**. This means that **blog.yourdomain.com**, **shop.yourdomain.com**, and **yourdomain.com** are each tracked and reported on individually — they do not share data within the same dashboard unless explicitly configured together.

Key points to understand about subdomain handling:

- **Subdomains are not automatically included** in a root domain project. You must add each subdomain as its own project if you want to monitor it.
- **Google Search Console data** is pulled per property. If your GSC property is set to the root domain (domain property), subdomain data may be included. If it is a URL-prefix property, only that specific subdomain or path is covered.
- **Backlink and keyword data** is scoped to the project URL you define at setup. A project for **yourdomain.com** will not automatically surface data for **shop.yourdomain.com**.
- **URL exclusion conditions are project-specific.** Patterns you configure for one project do not carry over to a subdomain project — you must configure exclusions independently for each.

## 🔄 Editing or Removing Existing Exclusion Rules

1. Go to **OTTO Settings** and open the relevant project.
2. Scroll to **URL Exclusion Conditions**.
3. Find the pattern you want to update or remove.
4. Click the **pencil icon** to edit or the **trash icon** to delete the rule.
5. Click **Save Settings** to confirm your changes.

## 💡 Tips for Effective URL Exclusion

- Start broad and refine. Test a wildcard pattern against a small set of known URLs before applying it to avoid accidentally excluding important pages.
- Exclude paginated URLs such as **\*?page=\*** if pagination creates duplicate content noise in your reports.
- Review your exclusion list periodically as your site structure changes — outdated rules can hide content you now want to track.
- Use exclusions alongside your **crawl settings** for the most precise control over what SearchAtlas indexes and reports on.

## 🆘 Need Help?

If you need further assistance, open the chat widget in the bottom-right corner of the platform and type **human teammate** to be connected with a member of our team.