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Fixing Common Yoast SEO Breadcrumb Issues: A Troubleshooting Guide

30 threads Sep 7, 2025 Plugin → Yoast seo

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Yoast SEO's breadcrumb feature is a powerful tool for site navigation and SEO, but users often encounter puzzling issues where breadcrumbs don't display as expected. Based on community reports, this guide covers the most common breadcrumb problems and their solutions.

Common Breadcrumb Issues and Their Solutions

1. Incorrect or Stale Data in Breadcrumbs

Problem: After updating a post's title, slug, or duplicating content, the breadcrumb continues to show old data (e.g., "(Duplikat)"), even though the edit screen field is empty. This data is often stored in the wp_yoast_indexable database table.

Solution: The most reliable fix is to reset Yoast SEO's optimization data. This clears out any invalid or incomplete cached information. You can do this by going to Yoast SEO > Tools and running the "Optimize SEO Data" and "Reset Indexables & Migrations" routines. Always back up your site before performing a reset.

2. Missing Taxonomy (Category) in Breadcrumb Trail

Problem: The breadcrumb trail for a post or custom post type (e.g., "Projects") suddenly stops showing a category (e.g., Home > Tours > Post Title instead of Home > Tours > Philippines > Post Title).

Solution: First, verify your settings in Yoast SEO > Settings > Advanced > Breadcrumbs. Ensure the correct taxonomy (e.g., "Project Categories") is selected for "Breadcrumbs for post types." If the setting is correct but the issue persists, a custom function may be needed to force the category into the breadcrumb links array.

add_filter( 'wpseo_breadcrumb_links', function( $links ) {
    if ( is_singular('project') ) { // Replace 'project' with your CPT
        $post = get_queried_object();
        $terms = get_the_terms( $post->ID, 'project_category' ); // Replace with your taxonomy
        if ( ! empty( $terms ) && ! is_wp_error( $terms ) ) {
            $term = reset( $terms ); // Gets the first term
            // Insert the term link before the last item (the post)
            array_splice( $links, -1, 0, array( array( 'url' => get_term_link( $term ), 'text' => $term->name ) ) );
        }
    }
    return $links;
});

Add this code to your child theme's functions.php file.

3. Breadcrumb Title Not Updating with Dynamic Shortcodes

Problem: When using shortcodes like [currentmonth] in your page title, the breadcrumb does not update automatically when the shortcode output changes (e.g., at the start of a new month). It only updates when the page is manually saved.

Solution: This happens because the breadcrumb title is stored in the database for performance. The breadcrumb is not designed to render dynamic shortcodes on every page load. A workaround is to use a filter to dynamically set the breadcrumb title for that specific page.

4. Wrong Taxonomy Displayed for Custom Post Types

Problem: If you have terms with identical slugs in different taxonomies (e.g., a post tag "photography" and a product category "Photography"), the breadcrumb might pull the term from the wrong taxonomy.

Solution: This is a complex conflict. The most straightforward fix is to ensure all your term slugs are unique across different taxonomies to prevent ambiguity. If that's not possible, a more advanced custom filter using wpseo_breadcrumb_links would be required to correctly identify and output the right term based on the current post type.

5. Home Link Points to the Wrong URL (Multilingual Sites)

Problem: On multilingual sites using WPML, the "Home" link in the breadcrumb points to the wrong language homepage for all secondary languages.

Solution: This is typically a configuration issue within your multilingual plugin. Double-check that the homepage for each language is correctly assigned in the WPML or translation plugin settings, not just in the standard WordPress reading settings.

General Troubleshooting Steps

  • Clear All Caches: Always clear your site, server, and browser cache after making changes.
  • Conflict Test: Temporarily switch to a default WordPress theme (like Twenty Twenty-Four) and disable all other plugins except Yoast SEO. If the breadcrumbs work, reactivate your plugins and theme one by one to find the conflict.
  • Re-save Settings: Sometimes, simply re-saving your permalinks (Settings > Permalinks) and Yoast SEO breadcrumb settings can resolve the issue.

For more advanced customization of the breadcrumb output, such as changing the separator, adding classes, or removing the final item, the Yoast SEO plugin provides filters like wpseo_breadcrumb_links, wpseo_breadcrumb_single_link, and wpseo_breadcrumb_output. The official Yoast SEO developer documentation provides examples for implementing these filters.

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