There is no rel="dofollow" attribute. A dofollow link is simply a link without rel="nofollow", rel="sponsored" or rel="ugc", any of which tell a search engine not to pass authority through it. The default state of a link is to count.
This trips people up when they add rel attributes for other reasons. rel="noopener" and rel="noreferrer" are security and privacy attributes and neither affects whether a link passes authority, though noreferrer does strip the referrer header, so the destination will not see the traffic in their analytics.
Paid or exchanged links are supposed to carry rel="sponsored". Marking them correctly is the difference between a disclosed arrangement and something a search engine treats as manipulation.
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Frequently asked
How do I tell if a link is dofollow?
View the page source and look at the anchor tag. If the rel attribute is missing, or contains only things like noopener, it is dofollow. If it contains nofollow, sponsored or ugc, it is not passing authority.
Do nofollow links have any value?
Yes, just not the same value. They still send referral traffic, still put your name in front of readers, and Google has said it treats nofollow as a hint rather than an absolute instruction. They are worth having; they are not worth paying link-building prices for.
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