Breadcrumbs

How breadcrumbs work

Breadcrumb navigation displays the page hierarchy: Home > Services > Web Design > Astro Development. This trail helps visitors understand where they are within your site structure and provides quick links to navigate backwards through parent pages.

Named after the fairy tale where Hansel and Gretel left breadcrumb trails to find their way home, this navigation pattern reduces the mental effort of understanding site structure. Visitors can jump back to any level rather than repeatedly hitting the back button.

SEO benefits of breadcrumbs

Search engines use breadcrumbs to understand site architecture and content relationships. Google often displays breadcrumb trails in search results instead of full URLs, providing context about where a page lives within your site.

Implementing breadcrumbs with proper structured data markup ensures search engines can parse and display them correctly. This creates additional internal links, distributes link equity, and improves crawl efficiency.

When to use breadcrumbs

Breadcrumbs benefit sites with clear hierarchical structure: e-commerce stores with product categories, documentation sites with nested sections, or large content sites with multiple levels. They're less valuable on flat sites with only a few pages.

For sites with multiple paths to the same page—products in multiple categories, for example—breadcrumbs should reflect the path the visitor actually took rather than showing an arbitrary hierarchy.

Design and placement

Position breadcrumbs near the top of the page, below the main navigation but above the page heading. Keep them visually subtle—they're utility navigation, not primary wayfinding. Use separators (>, /, or →) to clearly delineate hierarchy levels.

Ensure breadcrumbs work on mobile despite limited space. Truncating middle levels or using smaller text maintains functionality without overwhelming narrow viewports. Good breadcrumb implementation improves user experience without cluttering the interface.