If you only use one free SEO tool, make it Google Search Console. It’s the only place where Google tells you directly how your site appears in search: which searches show your pages, how often people click, which pages are indexed and what’s going wrong.
In this Google Search Console tutorial I’ll walk you through setting it up, the reports that matter for beginners, and how to fix the most common indexing problems. Everything here is based on Google’s own Search Console help documentation.
What is Google Search Console?
Google Search Console is a free service from Google that helps you monitor and improve how your website performs in Google Search. You don’t need it to appear in Google, but without it you’re guessing. With it you can:
- see the search queries that bring people to your site
- check whether your pages are indexed, and why some aren’t
- submit a sitemap so Google can find your pages
- inspect a URL and ask Google to crawl it again
- get alerts about security issues, manual actions and other problems
Search Console is different from Google Analytics. Search Console shows what happens before someone clicks (impressions and clicks in Google). Analytics shows what they do after they land on your site. Most sites need both. See my Google Analytics 4 tutorial for the second half.
Step 1: Add and verify your site
Go to Google Search Console, sign in with your Google account and add a property. You’ll be asked to choose between two property types:
| Domain property | URL-prefix property | |
|---|---|---|
| Example | example.com | https://www.example.com/ |
| Covers | All subdomains and both http and https | Only that exact address |
| Verification | DNS record only | HTML file, HTML tag, Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager or DNS |
| Best for | Most site owners | When you can’t edit DNS |
My recommendation: use a Domain property if you can edit your domain’s DNS. It gives you the full picture of your site in one place.
To verify a Domain property, Search Console gives you a TXT record. Add it in your domain registrar or DNS provider, wait a few minutes, then click Verify.
Two important points from Google’s help page:
- Don’t remove the verification record after it works. Google keeps checking it, and you’ll lose access if it disappears.
- If several people verify the same site, don’t delete each other’s verification tokens.
On WordPress, SEO plugins such as Yoast SEO or Rank Math can add the HTML tag for a URL-prefix property if you can’t use DNS.
Step 2: Submit your XML sitemap
A sitemap is a file that lists the pages you want Google to find. Most WordPress SEO plugins create one automatically (for example, Yoast uses /sitemap_index.xml).
- Open Indexing › Sitemaps in Search Console.
- Paste your sitemap address into Add a new sitemap.
- Click Submit.
You’ll see one of three statuses:
- Success: Google read the sitemap and queued its URLs for crawling.
- Has errors: Google read it but found problems; valid URLs are still used.
- Couldn’t fetch: Google couldn’t get the file. Common causes are a wrong URL, a robots.txt block or a temporary server problem.
A sitemap helps Google discover pages. It doesn’t guarantee that every page will be crawled or indexed.
Step 3: Learn the Performance report
The Performance report (Search results) is where you’ll spend most of your time. It shows four key metrics:
- Clicks: how many times people clicked through to your site from Google.
- Impressions: how many times your pages appeared in search results.
- CTR (click-through rate): clicks divided by impressions.
- Average position: the average ranking of your highest result.
Below the chart you can switch between Queries, Pages, Countries, Devices, Search appearance and Dates, and filter by date range and search type (web, image, video, news). The report covers up to 16 months of data, so you can compare this year with last year.
Three quick wins from the Performance report
- Find “almost there” keywords. Filter for queries with an average position of about 8–20. These pages are close to page one. Improving the content, title and internal links often moves them up. My keyword research guide explains how to use this data.
- Fix low CTR pages. A page with lots of impressions but a low CTR may need a clearer, more compelling title or meta description. See my on-page SEO checklist.
- Spot drops early. Compare the last 28 days with the previous period. A sudden drop on one page usually points to a technical change or a competitor; a site-wide drop may be an update or an indexing problem.
Step 4: Use the URL Inspection tool
Paste any URL from your site into the search bar at the top of Search Console. The URL Inspection tool tells you:
- whether the page is on Google (indexed), and if not, why
- which canonical URL Google chose
- whether the page was found in your sitemap
- any enhancements, such as structured data, and their errors
Click Test live URL to see whether Google can fetch and render the page right now. If you’ve fixed or updated a page, click Request indexing to ask Google to crawl it again.
Request indexing is limited by a daily quota, and Google says it doesn’t guarantee indexing. Use it for important new or updated pages, not for your whole site. For bulk discovery, rely on your sitemap and internal links.
Step 5: Check the Page indexing report
Under Indexing › Pages you’ll see how many pages are indexed and the reasons others aren’t. Some reasons are normal; some need fixing.
| Reason | What it usually means | Do you need to act? |
|---|---|---|
| Page with redirect | The URL redirects elsewhere | Usually no |
| Alternate page with proper canonical tag | Google is using another version | Usually no |
| Excluded by ‘noindex’ tag | You told Google not to index it | Only if it should be indexed |
| Not found (404) | The page doesn’t exist | Fix or redirect if it’s linked or important |
| Crawled – currently not indexed | Google saw it but chose not to index it | Improve content quality and internal links |
| Discovered – currently not indexed | Google knows the URL but hasn’t crawled it | Add internal links; check site speed and quality |
| Blocked by robots.txt | Your robots.txt stops crawling | Only if the page should be crawled |
Don’t aim for 100% of URLs indexed. Aim for all your important pages to be indexed.
Other reports worth knowing
- Core Web Vitals: shows pages with poor loading, responsiveness or layout stability, based on real-user data.
- Manual actions: tells you if Google has applied a penalty for spam. It should say “No issues detected”.
- Security issues: warns you about hacking or malware.
- Links: shows your top linked pages and linking sites.
How often should you check Search Console?
For a small site, I’d check it once a week for a few minutes: Performance for trends, Pages for new indexing problems, and any email alerts Google has sent. Do a deeper review once a month.
Frequently asked questions
Is Google Search Console free? Yes. It’s completely free for any site owner.
How long does it take for data to appear? For a brand-new site, expect to wait a few days after verification before the Performance report fills in. Pages need to be crawled and shown in search before they appear.
What’s the difference between Search Console and Google Analytics? Search Console shows how your site performs in Google Search before the click. Google Analytics shows what visitors do on your site after they arrive from any source.
Why isn’t my page indexed? Use the URL Inspection tool to see the reason. Common causes are a noindex tag, a robots.txt block, a duplicate page with another canonical, or Google deciding the page isn’t useful enough yet.
Does requesting indexing guarantee my page will rank? No. It only asks Google to crawl the page. Indexing and ranking depend on the page’s quality and relevance.
Related guides on WebTechHelp
Sources
- Google Search Console Help: Verify your site ownership
- Google Search Console Help: Manage your sitemaps using the Sitemaps report
- Google Search Console Help: Performance report (Search results)
- Google Search Console Help: URL Inspection tool
- TechCrunch: Google’s updated Search Console gives you 16 months of data
