What Is Yoast SEO? Simple Installation & Usage Guide (2025)

In a previous roundup, we explored 25 trusted SEO tools. One of the most popular on WordPress is Yoast SEO. This guide explains what Yoast SEO is and gives you a step-by-step tutorial to install, configure, and use it effectively on WordPress.

What Is Yoast SEO?

Basically, Yoast SEO is one of the most powerful and popular SEO tools available for WordPress. Whether you’re building a personal blog or managing client websites as a professional SEO, Yoast SEO is a must-have plugin that helps you optimize your content and website structure according to the best SEO practices.

The Yoast SEO plugin can be installed on any self-hosted WordPress website (except for the free WordPress.com plan that doesn’t support plugins). It’s known for being user-friendly and completely free to start with. While you can purchase Yoast SEO Premium to unlock more advanced features, most of the essential tools are already included in the free version.

In short, Yoast SEO is a plugin that assists you in checking titles, meta descriptions, managing XML sitemaps, and many other SEO-related functions. It acts like your personal SEO assistant inside WordPress — guiding you through keyword optimization, readability improvements, and technical setup.

By now, you probably understand more clearly what Yoast SEO is.
Next, let’s go through a step-by-step guide to installing and using the Yoast SEO WordPress Plugin effectively.

How to Install Yoast SEO in 6 Simple Steps

In reality, installing Yoast SEO is very straightforward. You just need to follow these six simple steps:

1. Log in to your WordPress website

After logging in, you’ll see the main Dashboard (the admin panel) of your WordPress site.

2. Click on “Plugins”

On the left-hand sidebar, you’ll find a menu with several options. Click on “Plugins”.

3. Search for “Yoast SEO”

Next, click on “Add New” at the top of the screen. Then, type “Yoast SEO” into the search bar.

4. Install the plugin

Once the search results appear, locate the Yoast SEO plugin and click “Install Now” to begin the installation process.

5. Activate the plugin

After the installation is complete, click “Activate”. This button will appear in the same spot as the “Install Now” button did earlier.

6. Done!

That’s it — you’ve successfully installed Yoast SEO on your WordPress website. Now, you can move on to configuring and using the plugin to optimize your content.

Basic Guide to Using Yoast SEO for Beginners

In this section, you’ll learn the fundamental steps to start using Yoast SEO effectively. We’ll cover three key areas: how to enter accurate information in the Yoast SEO Configuration Wizard, what the Yoast SEO Meta Box is and how it works, and the main things you can do inside the Yoast SEO Dashboard. After this, we’ll move on to some advanced settings in the following parts.

Using the Yoast SEO Configuration Wizard

After installing Yoast SEO, you can access its main panel by clicking the “SEO” tab on the left sidebar of your WordPress dashboard. If this is your first time using the plugin, you’ll see a notification titled “First-time SEO Configuration.” Click the link labeled “Configuration Wizard” — this tool will guide you through all the basic SEO settings you need.

Then, on the first page of the wizard, click “Configure Yoast SEO” to begin. Below are the detailed steps of the setup process.

Step 1: Environment

Here, you’ll be asked to select your website’s environment. There are two options (A and B), and it’s strongly recommended to always choose Option A — which indicates that your website is ready to be indexed by search engines.

Step 2: Site Type

Next, choose the type of website that best represents your site — for example: Blog, Online Shop, News Site, Portfolio, or Other.

Step 3: Organization or Person

Select whether your website represents an organization or an individual. If you choose Organization, you’ll need to fill in the organization name and upload the organization logo (minimum size 112×112 px — ideally a square image).
If you choose Person, simply enter the person’s name and fill in their social media profiles. This information helps Yoast SEO create Knowledge Graph data for Google, improving your brand visibility in search results.

Step 4: Search Engine Visibility

In this step, you can decide which types of content should appear in search engine results. Unless you have specific requirements, it’s best to leave these settings as default — Yoast’s default configuration works perfectly for most sites.

Step 5: Multiple Authors

If your website has only one author, Yoast SEO will automatically mark your author archives as noindex to prevent duplicate content issues. However, if your site has multiple authors, choose “Yes” — so Google can index author archive pages individually.

Step 6: Google Search Console

Google Search Console (GSC) is a free tool from Google that lets you track your website’s organic search performance. If you already use GSC, click “Get Google Authorization Code,” then enter the code to connect Yoast SEO to your account. If not, you can simply click “Next” to skip this step.

Step 7: Title Settings

Your SEO title is the clickable headline that appears in Google search results (and in browser tabs). By default, Yoast SEO formats titles as:
Post Title | Website Name
In this section, you can customize the Website Name and the Title Separator (such as “–”, “|”, or “•”).
Example:
If your article title is “How to Write SEO Optimized Articles” and your site name is Kinsta Demo Site, it will appear as:
How to Use Yoast SEO – Kinsta Demo Site

Step 8 & 9: Newsletter and Premium Offers

Yoast SEO will then offer to sign you up for their newsletter and show optional premium products or SEO courses. You can simply skip both by clicking “Next.”

Step 10: Success!

Congratulations — you’ve completed the setup! Click “Close” to finish the wizard and return to your dashboard.

At this point, your Yoast SEO plugin is fully configured and ready to help you optimize your website content. Next, we’ll explore the Yoast SEO Meta Box, where you’ll perform most of your on-page optimization.

Using the Yoast SEO Meta Box

The Yoast SEO Meta Box is where you’ll spend most of your time working with the plugin. It appears below the WordPress content editor (or in the right-hand sidebar if you’re using the block editor). This section allows you to analyze and optimize each page or post individually, ensuring that your content is SEO-friendly and easy to read.

The Meta Box provides three main tabs you’ll interact with: Content Optimization, Social, and Advanced.

Content Optimization Tab

This tab helps you check and improve both the readability and SEO quality of your content.

At the top of this tab, you’ll see a live preview of how your page will appear in Google search results — including the SEO title, URL slug, and meta description. You can click “Edit Snippet” to customize these fields manually. The preview updates in real time as you type, allowing you to craft the perfect title and description to attract more clicks.

Below the snippet editor, you’ll find two analysis sections:

1. Readability Analysis:
Yoast SEO automatically evaluates the structure and clarity of your writing. It checks sentence length, paragraph size, use of passive voice, and transition words. The plugin uses a color-coded system — green for good, orange for okay, and red for needs improvement. These suggestions help you make your content easier to read and more engaging for visitors.

2. SEO Analysis:
Here, you can enter your focus keyphrase — the main keyword you want the page to rank for. Yoast will then analyze your content and provide feedback on how well it’s optimized for that keyphrase. It checks whether the keyword appears in the title, introduction, headings, meta description, and throughout the body text. You’ll also see suggestions on how to improve keyword density, add internal links, or adjust the text length.

If you’re using the Premium version of Yoast SEO, you can add related keyphrases to optimize your article for multiple search terms.

You’ll also see a section called Cornerstone Content, where you can mark a post as one of your most important pages. Cornerstone articles usually cover broad topics, are longer, and serve as the main hub for related posts within your website.

Social Tab

The Social tab allows you to customize how your content will appear when shared on social media platforms like Facebook or X (Twitter). You can set a specific title, description, and image for each platform. This ensures that when someone shares your post, it looks exactly how you want it to — consistent, attractive, and click-worthy.

If you don’t customize these manually, Yoast SEO will automatically use your SEO title, meta description, and featured image as defaults.

Advanced Tab

In the Advanced tab, you can control how search engines interact with your content. This is where you can:

• Prevent search engines from indexing a specific post or page (set to “noindex”).
• Disable links on a page from being followed by crawlers (set to “nofollow”).
• Specify a canonical URL if the content exists elsewhere, to avoid duplicate content issues.

Most users won’t need to change these settings often, but they’re useful when managing technical SEO for complex websites.

After you’ve optimized your page using the Yoast SEO Meta Box, you’ll see color indicators next to your analysis results. Aim for green wherever possible, but remember — these are guidelines, not strict rules. It’s always better to focus on writing natural, high-quality content rather than forcing keywords just to meet the checklist.

Next, let’s explore the Yoast SEO Dashboard, where you can manage plugin settings and get a full overview of your site’s SEO health.

Exploring the Yoast SEO Dashboard

After setting up the plugin and learning how to use the Meta Box, the next step is to understand the Yoast SEO Dashboard — the central hub where you can manage settings, monitor SEO performance, and fix common site issues. The Dashboard is located under the SEO tab in your WordPress sidebar.

When you open the Dashboard, you’ll see several key sections: Notifications, General Settings, Features, and Webmaster Tools. Each plays an important role in how your SEO plugin operates.

Notifications Section

At the top of the Dashboard, Yoast SEO displays notifications and alerts related to your website’s SEO health. These messages help you identify and resolve potential problems that could impact your rankings.

For example, if your site’s tagline is still set to the WordPress default (“Just another WordPress site”), Yoast will notify you to change it. Similarly, you might receive alerts about missing meta descriptions, broken links, or sitemap errors.
Each notification comes with a “Learn More” or “Fix” button — guiding you through the process of resolving the issue directly from your WordPress admin panel.

General Tab

The General tab mainly provides access to the Yoast SEO setup tools and overall plugin information. Here, you can:

• Reopen the Configuration Wizard at any time to adjust your initial setup.
• View basic information about your website’s SEO configuration.
• Check the number of internal links across your posts and pages if you’re using Yoast Premium.

While this tab doesn’t require frequent use, it’s helpful for revisiting or tweaking your original setup as your site grows.

Features Tab

The Features tab allows you to enable or disable specific Yoast SEO functionalities. Each feature comes with a short description and a toggle switch.

Some of the most useful features include:

• SEO Analysis: Provides keyword optimization feedback for each page or post.
• Readability Analysis: Analyzes sentence structure, paragraph length, and readability.
• Cornerstone Content: Helps you highlight your most important articles.
• XML Sitemaps: Automatically generates and updates your site’s sitemap for search engines.
• Text Link Counter: Counts internal and outbound links within your content to help you improve site structure.
• Admin Bar Menu: Adds quick SEO shortcuts to your WordPress admin toolbar.
• Security for Authors: Restricts access to advanced SEO settings so that only editors and administrators can modify index and canonical settings.

You can freely turn these features on or off depending on your workflow. For example, if you prefer a cleaner writing experience, you might disable the readability analysis. However, it’s generally best to keep most features enabled — especially XML sitemaps and SEO analysis.

Webmaster Tools Tab

This tab helps you verify your website ownership with major search engines such as Google Search Console, Bing Webmaster Tools, Yandex, and Baidu.
Verifying your site allows these platforms to collect data and display performance reports about your website in their dashboards. To verify your site, simply paste the HTML verification code provided by the search engine into the corresponding field, then save changes.

Once verified, your site will begin syncing data automatically — allowing you to monitor search visibility, track impressions and clicks, and detect crawl issues faster.

With the Dashboard properly configured, you now have a full overview of your website’s SEO performance and control over how Yoast SEO interacts with search engines.
In the next section, we’ll explore Advanced Yoast SEO Settings — including Search Appearance, Taxonomies, and Breadcrumbs — to help you fine-tune every aspect of your site’s SEO structure.

Advanced Yoast SEO Settings

Once you’ve mastered the basics, it’s time to explore the more advanced settings of Yoast SEO. These configurations give you deeper control over how your website appears in search engines, how data is structured, and how Google understands your content. You can find all these options under SEO → Search Appearance in your WordPress dashboard.

Search Appearance

The Search Appearance section determines how your website’s pages, posts, and archives are displayed in Google search results. This is also where you manage schema markup, Knowledge Graph data, and title/meta templates.

When you open the Search Appearance menu, you’ll see several tabs: General, Content Types, Taxonomies, Archives, and Breadcrumbs.

General Tab

In this tab, you can modify your site’s Knowledge Graph and Schema settings. These settings tell Google whether your website represents an individual or an organization — and provide structured data to enhance your search listings.

If you didn’t set this up during the Configuration Wizard, you can update it here by entering:

• The organization or person’s name.
• The organization logo (square format recommended).
• Links to your social media profiles (Facebook, LinkedIn, X, Instagram, etc.).

Since version 11.0 and above, Yoast SEO automatically adds JSON-LD structured data to your site’s code. This data helps Google generate rich results and Knowledge Panels for your brand, covering entities such as:

• Organization (your business)
• Person (if you represent yourself)
• Website (overall site data)
• WebPage (individual page info)
• Article (blog post data)

You can test your schema data using Google’s Rich Results Test tool to ensure everything is correctly configured.

Content Types Tab

This tab lets you control how each content type (posts, pages, or custom post types) appears in search results. You can customize the default title and meta description templates for each content type using snippet variables.

This will automatically display the post title followed by your website name.

You can also decide whether each type should be indexed or not by search engines (using the “Show in search results” toggle).
If you want Google to ignore specific types of content, such as private posts or landing pages, you can set them to “No.”

Taxonomies Tab

Taxonomies refer to categories, tags, or any custom taxonomy you’ve created. In this tab, you can control how these taxonomy archive pages are indexed and displayed.

One useful feature here is the option to remove category base slugs from URLs.

This makes URLs cleaner, shorter, and more SEO-friendly.

Archives Tab

This section controls how author archives and date archives appear in search results.

If your website only has one author, Yoast automatically marks author archives as noindex to avoid duplicate content. However, for multi-author blogs, it’s best to leave them enabled so that each author’s content can be indexed separately.

You can also disable date-based archives if your blog doesn’t rely on publishing dates — this helps prevent outdated pages from appearing in search results.

Breadcrumbs Tab

Breadcrumbs are a type of secondary navigation that shows users where they are within your site’s structure. They also appear in Google search results, improving click-through rates and user navigation.

Yoast SEO makes it easy to enable breadcrumbs. You can toggle them on here, then insert a small code snippet into your WordPress theme.
Once activated, your visitors — and Google — will see a clear hierarchy of your content, which strengthens your internal linking structure.

Social and Tools Settings

After you’ve set up your Search Appearance and structured data, the next step is to configure Social Settings and make use of Yoast’s Tools section. These two areas help you connect your website with external platforms and streamline your SEO workflow.

Social Settings

You can find this section by navigating to SEO → Social in your WordPress dashboard.

Yoast SEO uses the information here to improve how your website interacts with major social media platforms such as Facebook, X (Twitter), Pinterest, and LinkedIn. By connecting these accounts, Yoast ensures that your content is displayed correctly when shared and that your brand identity is consistent across platforms.

Here’s a breakdown of the available tabs and what they do:

Facebook

Under the Facebook tab, you can enable Open Graph metadata — a key feature that allows Facebook to display your posts with the correct title, description, and thumbnail image when shared.

You can also:

• Upload a default image that will appear when a post doesn’t have a featured image.
• Verify your Facebook page by linking it to your website.

This helps your brand look professional and ensures that all shared content aligns with your visual identity.

Twitter

The Twitter tab lets you enable Twitter Card metadata, ensuring that your content displays as a “summary card” or “summary card with large image” when shared on X (formerly Twitter).

You can also choose between two display formats:

• Summary Card: Shows a small thumbnail next to your title and description.
• Large Image Card: Displays a full-width image for higher engagement.

Selecting “Large Image” is usually better for visibility and click-through rates.

Pinterest

For Pinterest, Yoast allows you to verify your website by entering your Pinterest verification code.
Once verified, Pinterest can read your Open Graph data (from the Facebook tab) to display your pins correctly.

Other Social Profiles

In the main section of Social Settings, you can also add links to your official profiles — such as YouTube, LinkedIn, Instagram, TikTok, or any others.
These links are then embedded into your site’s schema markup, helping Google associate your brand with verified social channels and display them in your Knowledge Panel.

Once these connections are set up, every post you publish will automatically include optimized metadata for social platforms — meaning your content will always look professional when shared anywhere online.

Tools Settings

The Tools section in Yoast SEO is designed for more advanced users and developers. It provides direct access to important SEO files and allows you to manage configurations efficiently. You can find it under SEO → Tools.

Here’s what’s included:

1. Import and Export Settings

If you manage multiple websites, this feature saves a lot of time. You can export all your Yoast SEO settings from one site and import them into another.
This ensures that all your SEO configurations, titles, meta templates, and indexing preferences remain consistent across your network of sites.

2. File Editor

The File Editor lets you directly edit critical SEO files like robots.txt and .htaccess from your WordPress dashboard.

Yoast automatically creates a robots.txt file if one doesn’t already exist. But note — if you don’t see the File Editor, it likely means your hosting provider has disabled file writing permissions.

3. Bulk Editor

This tool allows you to edit multiple SEO titles and meta descriptions simultaneously, without having to open each post individually.
It’s extremely useful for large websites or online stores with dozens (or hundreds) of pages.

4. Text Link Counter (Premium Feature)

In the Premium version, the Text Link Counter shows how many internal links each post has and how many times it’s linked from other pages.
This helps you identify orphaned pages (pages with no internal links) and improve your site’s overall linking structure — a key factor for SEO ranking.

Yoast SEO Premium Features

While the free version of Yoast SEO is powerful enough for most beginners, the Premium version unlocks several advanced tools that make professional SEO management faster, smarter, and more efficient.

If you’re running a serious business website, blog network, or eCommerce store, upgrading to Yoast SEO Premium can save you time and help you achieve stronger rankings with less manual work.

Here’s a detailed breakdown of the key Premium features:

1. Redirect Manager

The Redirect Manager is one of the most valuable features of Yoast SEO Premium. It allows you to easily set up and manage URL redirects directly from your WordPress dashboard.

Whenever you delete or move a page, Yoast automatically prompts you to create a redirect — preventing 404 errors and preserving your SEO rankings.

You can choose from several redirect types:

• 301 (Permanent Redirect): The old URL permanently redirects to the new one.
• 302 (Temporary Redirect): The redirect is temporary.
• 410 (Content Deleted): Tells search engines that the page is intentionally removed.
• 451 (Content Unavailable): Used for legal or privacy-related removals.

2. Internal Linking Suggestions

Yoast SEO Premium includes an Internal Linking Suggestions tool that automatically recommends related pages or posts to link to as you write.

This feature helps strengthen your website’s internal link structure — one of Google’s top ranking factors.

For example, when writing an article about “WordPress SEO tools,” Yoast may suggest linking to other related posts like “How to Set Up Jetpack for SEO” or “Best WordPress Plugins for Site Speed.”

The internal link recommendations appear in the sidebar of the WordPress editor. You can simply drag and drop the suggested links into your content.

This not only improves crawlability and authority distribution but also keeps visitors on your website longer — boosting engagement and conversions.

3. Content Insights

The Content Insights feature analyzes your article in real time and displays the five most frequently used words or phrases.

This gives you an instant overview of whether your content actually reflects the topic you want to rank for.

For instance, if your target keyword is “Yoast SEO setup,” but your top used phrases are “WordPress plugins” and “SEO tools,” then your focus might be too broad.

By using this insight, you can adjust your writing to ensure stronger keyword relevance and topical focus.

4. Related Keyphrase Optimization

Previously called “Multi-Keyword Optimization,” this feature lets you add multiple focus keyphrases per post.

In the free version, you can only optimize one focus keyword. But with Premium, you can include several — like synonyms and related keyphrases — that help Google better understand your topic’s context.

For example:

• Primary keyphrase: “Yoast SEO plugin”
• Related keyphrases: “WordPress SEO plugin,” “Yoast SEO setup,” “SEO optimization tool”

By optimizing for all related variations, your content can rank for a broader range of search queries — increasing your overall organic traffic.

5. Social Preview

The Social Preview tool lets you see exactly how your post will look when shared on Facebook or X (Twitter) — before you hit publish.

You can preview and edit:

• The post title
• The meta description
• The featured image

If something looks off, you can adjust it directly in the preview panel — ensuring that your posts always appear polished and click-worthy on social media.

This feature saves time, prevents mistakes, and guarantees that your shared links align perfectly with your brand’s visual style and tone.

6. Premium Support

Yoast SEO Premium users gain access to 24/7 expert support from the official Yoast team.
This is especially valuable for beginners or agencies managing multiple sites, as the support team can help troubleshoot configuration issues, sitemap problems, or schema conflicts directly.

7. Automatic Redirects for Changed URLs

When you update a URL or slug, Yoast Premium automatically creates a redirect from the old URL to the new one.
This ensures you never lose traffic due to broken links — even if you forget to set up a redirect manually.

Summary of Premium Advantages

Feature	Free Version	Premium Version
Focus Keyphrases	1	Multiple
Redirect Manager	❌	✅
Internal Link Suggestions	❌	✅
Content Insights	❌	✅
Social Previews	❌	✅
24/7 Support	❌	✅
Auto Redirect on URL Change	❌	✅

Yoast SEO Premium turns the already-powerful free plugin into a complete SEO suite — perfect for marketers, agencies, and serious website owners who want to optimize efficiently and at scale.

The Four Yoast SEO Add-On Plugins

In addition to Yoast SEO Premium, the Yoast team also offers four specialized extensions designed to boost your website’s SEO in specific areas: video, news, local search, and eCommerce. These plugins integrate seamlessly with Yoast SEO and are ideal for websites that rely on rich media, local presence, or regular publishing.

1. Yoast Video SEO

If your site contains lots of video content, Yoast Video SEO helps Google understand and index those videos properly. By generating detailed schema markup and video sitemaps, this plugin ensures your videos appear in Google Video search results and have a better chance of earning Rich Snippet placements.

Key benefits include:

• Automatic video XML sitemaps for easier crawling and indexing.
• Schema markup for video content so Google knows your video’s title, duration, and thumbnail.
• Compatibility with popular platforms such as YouTube, Vimeo, Wistia, and self-hosted videos.
• Control over video previews in social shares.

Example: If you run a tutorial channel or embed product walkthroughs on your site, Video SEO helps Google surface those clips directly in the SERP — dramatically improving visibility and click-through rates.

2. Yoast News SEO

Yoast News SEO is designed for news websites or blogs publishing time-sensitive articles. It optimizes your content to meet Google News requirements so your articles can appear in the “Top Stories” carousel and Google News feeds.

Main features include:

• Automatic creation of News XML sitemaps to help Google quickly find your latest articles.
• Support for standout tags, which signal to Google that an article is exclusive or important.
• Custom optimization for headline length, date structure, and other elements Google News looks for.

This plugin doesn’t automatically guarantee inclusion in Google News, but it optimizes every technical aspect so that when your site is approved, your articles rank competitively and are indexed fast.

3. Yoast Local SEO

For businesses that depend on local customers — such as restaurants, agencies, or retail stores — Yoast Local SEO is an essential extension. It provides all the structured data search engines need to display your business in local search results and Google Maps.

Core benefits:

• Adds schema markup for business details such as name, address, phone number (NAP), and opening hours.
• Integrates with Google Maps and directions links.
• Supports multiple locations with separate business pages.
• Enhances “near me” search results and local visibility.

Example: If someone searches “digital marketing agency near me,” Local SEO helps ensure your agency appears with accurate address, phone number, and map placement.

4. Yoast WooCommerce SEO

If you run an online store built on WooCommerce, this add-on helps bridge the gap between eCommerce and SEO. Yoast WooCommerce SEO refines product schema, metadata, and Open Graph details so your products look better on both search engines and social platforms.

Main features:

• Improved product schema for better display in Google Shopping and Rich Results.
• Enhanced breadcrumbs and structured navigation for product pages.
• Clean, SEO-friendly product URLs (removes redundant category paths).
• Optimized Open Graph data for better social sharing (image, price, description).

This plugin integrates perfectly with WooCommerce and Yoast SEO Premium, giving your online store a polished, professional presence that drives both visibility and conversions.

Which Add-On Is Right for You?

Website Type	Recommended Plugin
Video-heavy tutorial or course site	Yoast Video SEO
News or magazine site	Yoast News SEO
Local business or service provider	Yoast Local SEO
eCommerce or product-based store	Yoast WooCommerce SEO

These extensions are available individually or bundled with Yoast SEO Premium as part of the “Yoast SEO All-in-One” package.

Conclusion

By now, you’ve explored everything from what Yoast SEO is to how to install, configure, and optimize it for maximum search visibility. Whether you’re running a personal blog, a business website, or a large eCommerce platform, Yoast SEO remains one of the most powerful tools in the WordPress ecosystem — combining ease of use with advanced SEO functionality.

The free version already covers all the essentials: keyword optimization, readability checks, XML sitemaps, and meta tags. But when you upgrade to Yoast SEO Premium, you gain access to time-saving automation, professional-grade insights, and priority support that take your SEO to the next level.

If you add the specialized extensions — Video SEO, News SEO, Local SEO, and WooCommerce SEO — you can build a site that’s optimized in every direction: content, visibility, and conversion.

In short, Yoast SEO gives you the framework to make your content not only rank better but also resonate more with your audience. Use it wisely, review its analytics regularly, and adjust your SEO strategy as Google evolves. Consistent optimization over time is what turns a good site into a dominant one.

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