This means that the URL in question is noindex, yet is included in an XML Sitemap.
Your XML Sitemap should only contain URLs you wish for search engines to index. If a URL is noindex, this is an explicit statement to search engines that you do NOT wish for the URL to be indexed.
As such, including a noindex URL in a sitemap provides conflicting information to search engines, and may result in unintended URLs getting indexed.
This Hint will trigger for any internal URL which is set to noindex, and is included in one of the submitted XML Sitemaps.
Consider the URL: https://example.com/page-a, which is included in a submitted XML Sitemap.
The Hint would trigger for this URL if it had a noindex in either the <head> or the HTTP header (or both):
Meta noindex in the <head>,
<!doctype html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<title>example</title>
<meta name="robots" content="noindex,nofollow">
...
</head>
<body>...</body>
</html>
OR in the HTTP header:
HTTP/... 200 OK
...
X-Robots-Tag: noindex
This Hint is marked 'Critical' as it represents a fundamentally breaking issue, which may have a serious adverse impact upon organic search traffic. It is strongly recommended that Critical issues are dealt with as a matter of high priority.
The current setup is technically incorrect, and may cause indexing issues.
To resolve it, you would need to do one of the following:
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