Fixing uncrawlable overlay content

Content placed inside overlays is not crawled by Google and will not contribute to your site’s search rankings. If important text or links exist only inside an overlay, search engines won’t see them.

Why overlay content isn’t crawled

Search engines primarily index content that is available on the initial page load.

In Framer, overlays are not rendered in the HTML during the first load. This improves performance, optimizes the page output, and enables smooth Motion animations. However, it also means that any content inside an overlay is not present when search engines first process the page. Because of this:

• Text inside overlays is not indexed

• Links inside overlays are not discovered

• Pages linked only from overlays may not be crawled

There is currently no way to make overlay content crawlable.

Common SEO issues caused by overlays

Overlays are often used for:

• Navigation menus

• Hidden link lists

• Modal content

• “Read more” sections

If your navigation relies entirely on an overlay, search engines may not detect those links. Any page linked only from that overlay becomes an orphan page, meaning it has no visible internal links for crawlers to follow.

Orphan pages are harder to discover and may not rank well.

How to fix it

If you want Google to discover specific content or links, do not place them exclusively inside overlays. Instead:

• Add important links directly to the page layout.

• Include key navigation links in the footer.

• Add links within visible body content.

• Create an HTML sitemap that lists all important pages.

• Make sure every page is linked from at least one non-overlay element.

These steps ensure search engines can crawl and understand your site structure.