Links with no anchor text: fix the SEO and a11y gap

What it means

One or more internal links on this page have no anchor text — nothing readable between the <a> tags — and no aria-label and no contained <img> with alt text to supply an accessible name. Anchor text is a primary signal Google uses to understand a linked page; an empty link passes none of it. WCAG 2.1 SC 2.4.4 (Level A) also requires every link to communicate its purpose through text, aria-label or title.

Why it matters

Google's own guidance says anchor text helps it understand what the linked page is about. When the anchor is empty, the destination loses a keyword signal it would otherwise receive from every linking page — and on content-heavy sites (icon buttons, image links, injected nav) empty anchors can recur dozens of times, collectively suppressing internal link equity. The accessibility failure is mandatory to fix: a screen reader announces an empty <a> as "link" with no destination context, making the page unusable for assistive-technology users.

How to fix it

1. For text links, add descriptive anchor text naming the destination ("View the pricing table", not "click here").
2. For image links, add a meaningful alt to the contained <img> — the link inherits it as its accessible name.
3. For icon-only links, add an aria-label to the <a> element and mark the icon aria-hidden="true".
4. Validate with your browser's accessibility inspector that each link now has a computed accessible name.

When it's not a problem

Links that already carry a well-formed aria-label, or wrap an <img> with non-empty alt, are accessible and are not flagged. Links containing only whitespace or invisible Unicode are treated as empty — those are nearly always template/CMS rendering bugs worth fixing.

How common is it?

22 audited sites in our corpus currently show this issue. The breakdowns below show which platforms, gatekeepers, verticals and countries are most exposed.