---
title: "Why Does Google Choose a Different Canonical URL Than the One I Set?"  
description: "Why Does Google Choose a Different Canonical URL Than the One I Set?"  
author: "Ajmal Sultani"  
published: 2026-10-17  
canonical: https://answers.mindstick.com/qa/117736/why-does-google-choose-a-different-canonical-url-than-the-one-i-set  
category: "Mix Category"  
tags: ["seo", "google search", "Technical SEO"]  
reading_time: 1 minute  

---

# Why Does Google Choose a Different Canonical URL Than the One I Set?

I added a canonical tag to a page, but Google’s indexed version still points to another URL on my site. The pages are very similar, though they aren’t exact duplicates: one is a filtered listing, and the other is the main category page.

How does Google decide that the alternate URL is a better canonical? I’m trying to work out whether this is usually caused by internal links, redirects, sitemap entries, or the page content itself—and which signals are worth checking first.


---

Original Source: https://answers.mindstick.com/qa/117736/why-does-google-choose-a-different-canonical-url-than-the-one-i-set

Copyright © MindStick Software Pvt. Ltd. This Markdown version is provided for developers, AI systems, and offline reading.