Google Search Console (GSC) is the free tool that shows how Google sees your site: which queries bring clicks, which pages are indexed (and why others aren’t), crawl problems, Core Web Vitals, security issues and manual actions. If you run a website, set it up on day one, because data only starts collecting after verification.

Domain property vs URL-prefix property

Property type Covers Verification
Domain (example.com) All protocols and subdomains (http, https, www, blog.…) DNS TXT record only
URL prefix (https://example.com/) Exactly that protocol and host HTML file, meta tag, Analytics, Tag Manager, or DNS

Use a domain property for the full picture. Add URL-prefix properties too if you want separate reports for a subdomain or section.

Verify with DNS

  1. Search Console → Add property → Domain → enter example.com.
  2. Copy the TXT record (google-site-verification=…).
  3. Add it at your DNS provider, as a TXT record on the root (@).
  4. Wait for DNS to update, then click Verify:
dig +short TXT example.com

Keep the TXT record: removing it un-verifies the property later. See DNS records explained and DNS propagation.

For a URL-prefix property, uploading the HTML verification file to the web root is often easiest on a VPS:

sudo cp google1234abcd.html /var/www/example.com/
curl -I https://example.com/google1234abcd.html

Submit your sitemap

Sitemaps → enter sitemap.xml (or sitemap-index.xml) → Submit. GSC shows whether it was fetched and how many URLs were discovered. Also list it in robots.txt. See XML sitemaps and the robots.txt guide.

The reports that matter

Performance: clicks, impressions, CTR and average position, by query, page, country and device, for up to 16 months. Useful filters:

  • pages with many impressions but low CTR → improve titles and descriptions;
  • queries ranking at positions 5–15 → improve and expand those pages;
  • compare date ranges after changes or migrations.

Pages (indexing): indexed vs not indexed, with reasons:

Reason Usually means
Excluded by noindex Intended? Check templates and plugins
Blocked by robots.txt Intended? See the robots.txt report
Page with redirect / Not found (404) Normal for old URLs; fix internal links pointing to them
Duplicate, Google chose different canonical Canonical signals conflict. See canonical URLs
Soft 404 Thin or empty pages returning 200
Crawled – currently not indexed Quality or value issue
Discovered – currently not indexed Google hasn’t crawled it yet (crawl budget, weak internal links, slow server)
Server error (5xx) Server or application problems. Check logs

URL Inspection: enter any URL to see whether it’s indexed, the Google-selected canonical, the last crawl, and mobile rendering. Test live URL checks the current version, and Request indexing asks for a recrawl (useful for important updated pages; there’s a daily quota).

Core Web Vitals: field data (LCP, INP, CLS) for groups of URLs, from real Chrome users. See Core Web Vitals and server performance.

Settings → Crawl stats: requests per day, response times, status codes and file types, straight from Googlebot. Rising response times or 5xx errors here point to server problems. See log file analysis for SEO.

Security & manual actions: hacked content, malware, and penalties. These should always be empty.

Users and access

Settings → Users and permissions: give team members Full or Restricted access, rather than sharing your Google account. Agencies can be added and removed cleanly.

Site moves

When changing domains, verify both the old and new properties, set up 301 redirects, then use Settings → Change of address on the old property. See website migration SEO.

Also set up Bing Webmaster Tools

Bing can import your sites directly from Search Console. It powers Bing, DuckDuckGo’s results and several AI search tools, and supports IndexNow for instant URL submission.

Routine

How often Check
Weekly Performance trends, new 5xx or 404 spikes
Monthly Pages report, Core Web Vitals, top queries and pages
After releases URL Inspection of key pages, robots.txt, sitemap status
Always Email alerts for security issues and manual actions

Related: technical SEO on your own server and website speed optimization.

  • SEO
  • Google
  • Web Development