What does Google say about SEO? /
Google Search Console stands as the essential tool for SEO professionals seeking to optimize their website's organic visibility. This free platform delivers invaluable data on organic performance, indexation status, technical errors, and user behavior in search results. Official Google statements regarding Search Console are critical for properly interpreting coverage reports, performance data, URL inspection tools, and sitemap management features. SEO practitioners rely on these official positions to diagnose indexation issues, identify optimization opportunities, and monitor organic traffic evolution. Mastering functionalities like Core Web Vitals reports, structured data validation, internal and external link analysis, and page experience signals has become essential for modern SEO strategies. Understanding official recommendations helps avoid metric misinterpretation, optimize crawl budget efficiently, and make strategic decisions based on reliable data to sustainably improve SERP rankings. Whether troubleshooting mobile usability issues, monitoring manual actions, or analyzing search queries that drive traffic, Search Console insights combined with Google's official guidance provide the foundation for data-driven SEO decision-making and continuous performance improvement in an ever-evolving search landscape.
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Why does Search Console only show partial data for the News section at launch?
Data for the News section in Search Console (for News mode in Search, not Google News App) only goes back to around July 2020, which is when data collection began. For older sites, this view will be l...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★ Why is Google planning to remove the 'crawl anomaly' category from Search Console?
Google is working on removing the generic 'crawl anomaly' category in Search Console. Instead of grouping various issues, the data will be reclassified into more specific and useful categories. This c...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★★ Could your meta tags be hiding from Google without you even knowing?
Some third-party scripts inject tags (e.g. iframe) at the top of the <head>, which can lead Google to believe that the <head> is prematurely closed. Result: robots metatag, canonical, hreflang may be ...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★ Is your site migration stuck in 'pending' status in Search Console? Find out why!
A site move displayed as 'pending' in Search Console for months after submission signals no problem. This status simply indicates that Google is keeping track of the move. There is no 'completed' stat...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★★ Are Google’s manual penalties always visible in Search Console?
If a manual action has been taken by Google's Webspam team, it will almost always be visible in Search Console. There are a few rare edge cases where this would not be displayed, but for a normal site...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★ Should you really choose the 410 code over 404 for quick deindexing of a page?
The 410 (Gone) code removes pages from the index slightly faster than the 404, but in the long term, the difference is theoretical and negligible. For urgent removal, using the removal tool in Search ...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★ Does Google Tag Manager affect your content to the point of impacting your SEO?
If the 'container tag' refers to Google Tag Manager, Google processes it during the page rendering. GTM can add, modify, or remove content via JavaScript. Using URL Inspection allows you to see the re...
John Mueller Sep 14, 2020
★★★ Do Images in XML Sitemaps Count Toward the 50,000 URL Limit?
We know that XML Sitemap files are limited to 50,000 URLs. We also know that for each page URL, we can indicate the URLs of the main images it contains. But do these image URLs count as part of the 50...
John Mueller Sep 09, 2020
★★ Why are crawl stats a completely useless indicator for assessing the performance of your content?
To determine if content is underperforming, check the Performance Report in Search Console rather than the crawl stats. If you're getting a lot of impressions but few clicks, the content may need to b...
Martin Splitt Sep 09, 2020
★★ Why does Google refuse to track featured snippets in Search Console?
Featured snippets are not distinguished in Search Console because Google treats them as normal search results. Their presence can be indicated by a position 1 and their absence by a lower position, vi...
John Mueller Sep 04, 2020
★★★ Hreflang in HTML or XML Sitemap: Is There Really a Difference for Google?
For implementing hreflang, Google treats the <head> HTML tag and the declaration in an XML sitemap exactly the same. Both methods are equivalent, and the choice depends on the ease of implementation f...
John Mueller Sep 04, 2020
★★★ Why don’t the Search Console API and the web interface return the same data?
The Search Console API and the web interface use exactly the same backend. If no data is returned by the API while the interface displays it, the issue likely stems from a difference in domain verific...
John Mueller Sep 04, 2020
★★ Should you reconfigure Search Console every time you migrate from www to non-www?
When changing a prefix (www/non-www), you must verify the new property if the verification is prefix-based. Domain verification avoids this problem. Search Console is not required for the website's op...
John Mueller Sep 04, 2020
★★ Is the URL Parameters Tool in Search Console really doomed?
The URL Parameters Tool in Search Console has been lacking data for a long time not due to deprecation, but because of internal technical issues between teams. Google uses this data internally and pla...
John Mueller Sep 04, 2020
★★★ Should You Include Category Pages in Your XML Sitemap?
In response to a tweet asking whether category page URLs - article or product listing pages - should be included in the XML Sitemap, Fabrice Canel (Bing) answered yes, this file should include all URL...
Google Aug 31, 2020
★★ Why Did Google Remove Regex from Search Console Before Even Launching It?
A few weeks ago, the help documentation for the Search Console "Performance" report indicated that it was possible to use regex (regular expressions to filter data). Then John Mueller and Gary Illyes ...
John Mueller Aug 31, 2020
★★★ Should you really use Google Search Console's address change tool during a migration?
The address change tool in Search Console explicitly tells Google that a migration is intentional and not temporary or accidental. This additional signal allows Google to reprioritize the crawl, make ...
Martin Splitt Aug 27, 2020
★★★ How Does Google Actually Determine the Canonical URL of Your Pages?
John Mueller provided on Twitter a list of criteria that Google takes into account to define what the canonical URL of a page is (and therefore its "canonicalization"): redirects, internal links, exte...
John Mueller Aug 24, 2020
★★★ Should you still fill in the priority and changefreq attributes in your XML sitemaps?
Google does not use the priority or changefreq attributes in sitemap files. Only the URL and the lastmod date are taken into account. Priority has been ignored because websites filled it out in a non-...
John Mueller Aug 21, 2020
★★ Should you really let Google decide your crawl limit?
There is no recommended request/second limit (e.g., 30 req/s). The Search Console setting is a high limit, not a target. Google recommends leaving it on 'Google decides' unless crawling overloads the ...
John Mueller Aug 21, 2020
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