GSC knowledge base
GSC Indexing and URL Tutorials and Troubleshooting Guide
Distinguish discovered, crawled, allowed to index, and actually indexed, and prioritize important pages. Choose tutorials by specific issue, and check operations, limitations, and verification results item by item.
Decide whether the exact URL should be indexed
What to prepare
Open the reported URL and its intended canonical. Record HTTP status, robots directives, canonical tags and the URL Inspection result before changing anything.
| Your situation | First action | Read next |
|---|---|---|
| Discovered but not crawled | Check that the important page is reachable from navigation, is in the sitemap and responds consistently. | Discovered but not indexed: check discovery paths and crawling conditions |
| Crawled but not indexed | Compare the crawl date with your revision, inspect duplicate intent and confirm that the page answers a distinct task. | Crawled but not indexed: check value and signals page by page |
| Google chose another canonical | Compare the declared and selected canonical, redirects and internal links before requesting a recrawl. | Google chose a different canonical: align five types of signals |
| A redirect, noindex or 404 appears | Separate intentional exclusions from mistakes. Private workspaces and removed pages may correctly remain excluded. | 404, Soft 404, and 5xx: handle by business destination |
When to stop and verify
Important canonical pages return 200 and allow indexing; excluded variants have an explained purpose. Recheck Google after it processes the change, not immediately after deployment.
Choose another Search Console problem · Check the official requirements
Indexing and URLs
Distinguish discovered, crawled, allowed to index, and actually indexed; prioritize important pages.
URL inspection: look at historical indexing and live testing separately
URL Inspection contains two different kinds of evidence: the version Google indexed and a test of the page available now. Read their timestamps and results separately. A live test passing, or an indexing request being accepted, does not establish that the latest content is already indexed.
Steps · error branches · checklistPage indexing report: find important pages first, do not chase all green
The goal is to index useful canonical pages, not every URL or an all-green report. Define which pages should be searchable, classify the exclusions, and inspect important examples individually. A report sample is not a complete inventory, and validation is not immediate indexing.
Steps · error branches · checklistCrawled but not indexed: check value and signals page by page
‘Crawled, currently not indexed’ confirms a crawl without selection for indexing; it does not identify one root cause. For an important page, verify current delivery, assess its distinct reader value and compare duplicate alternatives. Repeated submission is not a substitute for that review.
Steps · error branches · checklistDiscovered but not indexed: check discovery paths and crawling conditions
‘Discovered, currently not indexed’ means Google knows the URL but has not yet crawled it. Check useful discovery paths, host health and unnecessary URL growth. The label alone does not prove a crawl-budget shortage or that Googlebot tried to fetch this specific page.
Steps · error branches · checklistGoogle chose a different canonical: align five types of signals
When Google selects another canonical, compare the actual pages and their signals before editing the tag. Canonical annotations express a preference for duplicate or very similar content. Align the intended destination's health, redirects, annotations, internal links and sitemap; keep genuinely distinct language pages distinct.
Steps · error branches · checklistnoindex and robots.txt: fix the correct blocking layer
Robots.txt controls crawling; noindex controls indexing when Google can read the instruction. First decide whether the URL should remain public and searchable, remain public but excluded, or require authentication. Apply the control for that purpose and inspect the delivered response, not only the source template.
Steps · error branches · checklist404, Soft 404, and 5xx: handle by business destination
Choose the response according to the page's real business state. Restore an accidentally broken page, redirect a moved page to its equivalent, or return a genuine removal response when no replacement exists. A 200 response with an empty or error body does not restore the reader's task.
Steps · error branches · checklistVideo indexing: first confirm the page is a watch page
A page being indexed does not mean its video is indexed. First confirm it is a genuine watch page, then test the player, thumbnail and media access. Use the video's reported reason to choose the repair; structured data cannot replace visible, playable content.
Steps · error branches · checklistCheck guide coverage and product capabilities separately
SEO operations adds bounded technical checks, saved index-version reads, laboratory records and human content review. Native Google security, Discover, News and enhancement reports still require their own tools. A guide explains a method; it does not establish every report is connected.
View real product capabilities