Central Europe · EU, euro, Schengen
SEO audit for websites in Slovakia
Slovakia shares a language family and a past with the Czech Republic, and many brands run a .sk site and a .cz site side by side. That makes duplicate-content and hreflang decisions the central SEO problem, along with the long list of Slovak accented letters.
These notes are written for sites aimed at Bratislava, Košice, Žilina and the Hungarian-speaking south.
Slovakia at a glance
- Languages and hreflang codes
- Slovak
sk-SKOfficial language - Hungarian
hu-SKMinority language, mainly in southern Slovakia - Czech
cs-CZWidely understood; treat it as a different market and language - English
en-SKB2B and tourism
- Slovak
- Script
- Latin with many accented letters, including ä, ô, ĺ, ľ, ŕ, č, š, ž, ď, ť and ň.
- Domain
- .sk is the country code.
- Native name
- Slovensko
- Currency
- Euro (EUR), since 2009
- Calling code
+421- Postcode
- 5 digits, written as 3 + 2 with a space
e.g. 811 01 (Bratislava) - EU, EEA and Schengen
- EU member since 2004, euro area member, and part of Schengen since December 2007.
Market notes for Slovakia
Slovak and Czech twin sites
Slovak and Czech are close, and Czech content is widely readable in Slovakia. A common setup is a .sk and a .cz domain with nearly identical pages. Without careful signals Google may choose one version for both markets. Link the pair with reciprocal hreflang tags (sk-SK and cs-CZ), canonicalise each page to itself and make the pages differ where it matters: the Czech site prices in koruna and the Slovak site in euro, delivery and returns policies differ, and legal texts follow local law.
Never copy a Czech page onto the Slovak domain with only the currency changed. Slovak readers notice Czech phrasing, and Google has two near-identical pages to rank.
The accent list is long; plan the slug policy
Slovak uses á, ä, č, ď, é, í, ĺ, ľ, ň, ó, ô, ŕ, š, ť, ú, ý and ž. Several of these do not exist in Czech, such as ä, ô, ĺ, ľ and ŕ, so a Czech-origin template can mishandle them. A simple ASCII mapping of ľ and ĺ to ‘l’ can merge words that look different on the page.
Keep full letters in titles, headings and structured data, and choose a single slug policy for every language folder. If you migrate from a Czech template, test pages with ľ, ĺ, ŕ, ô and ä specifically.
Hungarian-speaking southern Slovakia
A Hungarian-speaking minority lives mainly in the south, and for local services such as clinics, shops, notaries and schools a Hungarian version is a real service. Use hu-SK when the page is about Slovak addresses, prices and contacts, and hu when it is general guidance that suits Hungarian readers anywhere.
Do not copy a Hungary-market page into a /hu/ folder on your Slovak domain. The prices, contact details and legal notices would be wrong, and Google would see a near-duplicate of the Hungarian site.
Postcodes with a space, and structured data that matches
Slovak postcodes are written as three digits, a space and two digits, as in 811 01. Use that exact form in LocalBusiness markup, on the contact page and in your Google Business Profile, and store it as text. Differences between ‘81101’ and ‘811 01’ across citations are a small but common cause of messy local listings.
Add the +421 telephone in international format and the addressCountry as SK. If you operate on both sides of the Slovak-Czech border, keep separate Organization records for each legal entity and link them with a parentOrganization property only if one actually owns the other.
Copy-ready examples for Slovakia
Both snippets use placeholder data. Replace the domain, name, street, phone number, coordinates and prices with your own before you publish them.
hreflang tags
This set covers 3 versions (sk-SK, hu-SK, en) plus an x-default. Put the same full set in the <head> of every language version, each page listing itself too; Google ignores pairs that do not link back.
<link rel="alternate" hreflang="sk-SK" href="https://example.sk/sk/" />
<link rel="alternate" hreflang="hu-SK" href="https://example.sk/hu/" />
<link rel="alternate" hreflang="en" href="https://example.sk/en/" />
<link rel="alternate" hreflang="x-default" href="https://example.sk/sk/" />LocalBusiness JSON-LD
The postcode follows the Slovakia format (5 digits, written as 3 + 2 with a space) and the telephone starts with +421. Use the most specific business type that fits, and keep every detail identical to your footer, contact page and map listing.
{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "ProfessionalService",
"name": "Example Studio Bratislava",
"url": "https://example.sk/sk/",
"image": "https://example.sk/images/storefront.jpg",
"telephone": "+421 2 0000 0000",
"priceRange": "€€",
"address": {
"@type": "PostalAddress",
"streetAddress": "Vzorová 1",
"addressLocality": "Bratislava",
"postalCode": "811 01",
"addressCountry": "SK"
},
"geo": {
"@type": "GeoCoordinates",
"latitude": 48.1486,
"longitude": 17.1077
},
"openingHoursSpecification": [
{
"@type": "OpeningHoursSpecification",
"dayOfWeek": [
"Monday",
"Tuesday",
"Wednesday",
"Thursday",
"Friday"
],
"opens": "09:00",
"closes": "18:00"
}
]
}What the audit looks at
What the audit checks for Slovakia
hreflang between .sk, .cz and language folders
We verify that sk-SK, cs-CZ and hu-SK versions link to one another, use valid codes and include a self-reference.
Canonical conflicts across twin domains
A .sk page that canonicalises to the .cz copy disappears from Slovak results; the audit flags such cross-domain canonicals.
UTF-8 and Slovak letters
We check the charset and look for broken ľ, ĺ, ŕ, ô or ä in titles and descriptions.
LocalBusiness schema with a spaced postcode
We validate required properties, the +421 number and the NNN NN postcode format.
Questions about SEO in Slovakia
Should I run a .sk and a .cz site with the same content?
You can, if you link the pages with sk-SK and cs-CZ hreflang, canonicalise each to itself, and localise prices, delivery and legal texts. Pure copies compete with each other.
Is Czech content good enough for Slovak readers?
Many Slovak users read Czech without trouble, but Slovak copy is more trusted and ranks better for Slovak queries. Treat Czech as a separate market.
How do I write a Slovak postal code?
Three digits, a space and two digits, such as 811 01. Store it as text and keep it identical across your site and listings.
Do I need a Hungarian version?
If you serve customers in the Hungarian-speaking south, yes. Use hu-SK for pages with Slovak prices and addresses and plain hu for general guidance.
Is Slovakia in the euro area?
Yes, since 2009. It joined the EU in 2004 and became part of Schengen in December 2007.
Need a hand with Slovakia?
If your Slovakia audit turns up work you would rather hand over, two teams stand behind this tool. Nomor (nomor.tech) is our software development company and Limi Creatives (limicreatives.com) is our marketing company. Send us your report and tell us which market you are working in.
Nomor
Our software development company. Nomor designs and builds the software and websites behind this tool, including the audit engine, the PDF report and the pages you are reading. It is the right place to start for custom development, performance work and technical fixes.
Limi Creatives
Our marketing company. Limi Creatives is a creative agency that runs SEO, paid ads, content, social media and video for brands. It is the right place to start when you want help turning audit findings into traffic and enquiries.