Headless WordPress + Next.js: a practical SEO guide

Why headless (editor comfort + performance)

Headless WordPress gives you the best of both worlds: content editors get the familiar WordPress interface they know and love, while developers can build lightning-fast frontends with modern frameworks like Next.js.

The key advantage is separation of concerns. Your content team can focus on creating great content without worrying about technical constraints, while your development team can optimize for performance, SEO, and user experience.

Rendering mode selection (SSR vs SSG vs ISR)

Choosing the right rendering strategy is crucial for both performance and SEO:

• SSG (Static Site Generation): Perfect for content that doesn't change frequently. Pre-renders pages at build time for maximum speed.
• SSR (Server-Side Rendering): Use for dynamic content that needs to be fresh on every request.
• ISR (Incremental Static Regeneration): The sweet spot for most sites—static performance with the ability to update content.

For most WordPress + Next.js setups, we recommend starting with ISR and falling back to SSG for truly static pages.

WPGraphQL + caching hints

WPGraphQL is your bridge between WordPress and Next.js. Here are the key optimization strategies:

1. Query only what you need: Don't fetch unnecessary fields
2. Use fragments: Reuse common field sets across queries
3. Implement proper caching: Set appropriate cache headers and use Next.js built-in caching

Core Web Vitals pitfalls (fonts, hero images, 3rd-party scripts)

The most common performance killers we see:

• Fonts: Always preload critical fonts and use font-display: swap
• Hero images: Implement proper lazy loading and use next/image with priority
• Third-party scripts: Load analytics and tracking scripts asynchronously

Schema must-haves (Organization, Article, FAQ, Breadcrumb)

Essential schema markup for every headless WordPress site:

• Organization: Establishes your business entity
• Article: For blog posts and content pages
• FAQ: Helps with featured snippets
• Breadcrumb: Improves navigation understanding

Launch checklist (sitemaps, redirects, GA4/GTM, robots, monitoring)

Before going live, ensure you have:

• XML sitemaps configured
• 301 redirects for any URL changes
• GA4 and GTM properly implemented
• Robots.txt configured
• Error monitoring and uptime alerts set up

Conclusion

Start small—migrate one section, measure performance and SEO impact, then scale. The combination of WordPress's content management capabilities with Next.js's performance gives you a powerful foundation for growth.