SEO course › Part 1: SEO foundations
Google Search Console is a free tool from Google that shows how your website performs in Google Search. It tells you which searches bring visitors, which pages are indexed, and whether Google has found problems with your site. Setting up Google Search Console is one of the first things every website owner should do.
In this lesson you will learn how to add and verify your site, which property type to choose, and how to use the main reports to spot and fix problems.
What is Google Search Console used for?
Google Search Console (often shortened to GSC) is like a direct line between your website and Google. You do not need it for your site to appear in search, but it shows you information you cannot get anywhere else.
With Search Console you can:
- See the search queries that show your pages and how many people click.
- Check whether Google has crawled and indexed your pages.
- Submit a sitemap, which is a file listing the pages you want Google to find.
- Get alerts about indexing errors, security issues and manual actions (penalties applied by Google’s team).
- Ask Google to recrawl a page after you update it.
It is different from Google Analytics. Search Console shows what happens in Google Search before someone clicks, while Analytics shows what visitors do on your site afterwards. You will look at Analytics in the lesson on GA4 for SEO.
How do you set up Google Search Console?
You only need a Google account and access to your website or domain settings. Go to search.google.com/search-console and follow these steps.
- Sign in with the Google account your business will keep long term, not a personal account that a freelancer controls.
- Click “Add property” and choose a property type (explained below).
- Enter your domain or URL exactly as your site uses it.
- Verify that you own the site using one of the methods Google offers.
- Once verified, submit your XML sitemap in the Sitemaps report.
- Add team members or your SEO agency as users under Settings, rather than sharing your password.
After setup, some reports can take a few days to fill with data, so do not worry if they look empty at first.
Which property type should you choose?
| Property type | What it covers | How you verify it | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Domain property | All subdomains and both http and https versions | DNS record only | Most websites, if you can edit DNS settings |
| URL-prefix property | Only URLs starting with the exact address you enter | HTML file, HTML tag, Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager or DNS | Sites where you cannot change DNS, or tracking one section |
A domain property gives the most complete picture. To verify it, you add a TXT record to your domain’s DNS settings, usually through the company where you bought the domain.
What are the main Google Search Console reports?
Search Console has many reports, but beginners should focus on a few.
Performance report
This shows how your site performs in Google Search. It has four key metrics:
- Clicks: how many times people clicked through to your site.
- Impressions: how many times your pages appeared in search results.
- CTR (click-through rate): clicks divided by impressions.
- Average position: the average ranking position of your site’s top result for those searches.
You can filter by query, page, country, device and date. The report keeps up to 16 months of data. Clicks and impressions from AI features such as AI Overviews are counted within the Web search type rather than shown separately. For newer filters, see our post on the Search Console multimodal filter.
Page indexing report
This shows how many of your pages are indexed and lists the reasons others are not, such as “Crawled – currently not indexed” or “Excluded by noindex tag”. Not every unindexed page is a problem, but important pages should be indexed. You learned why in search engine indexing.
URL Inspection tool
Paste any URL from your site to see whether it is indexed, when Google last crawled it, and which canonical URL Google chose. After fixing or updating a page, you can click “Request indexing”.
Sitemaps report
Submit your sitemap URL here and check that Google can read it.
Experience, security and manual action reports
The Core Web Vitals and HTTPS reports show page experience issues. The Security issues and Manual actions reports warn you if your site is hacked or penalized, which is rare but serious.
How can a small business use Search Console?
Imagine an online saree shop run from Hyderabad. The owner opens the Performance report and notices that “handloom cotton sarees for office wear” gets many impressions but few clicks, with an average position around 8.
That is a clear opportunity. The owner improves the category page title and description to match the query more closely, adds helpful content about fabric care and office styling, and links to it from the home page. A few weeks later, the owner compares the date ranges to see whether clicks and position have improved.
The same shop also checks the Page indexing report and finds that several new product pages are “Discovered – currently not indexed”. It adds them to the sitemap and improves internal links so Google finds them more easily.
Common mistakes to avoid
- Setting up Search Console under an agency’s or former employee’s personal account.
- Verifying only one version of the site, such as http without https, with a URL-prefix property.
- Panicking over every excluded page instead of focusing on important ones.
- Clicking “Request indexing” repeatedly instead of fixing the underlying issue.
- Adding the property and never checking it again.
Key takeaways
- Google Search Console is free and shows how Google sees and ranks your site.
- A domain property, verified through DNS, gives the most complete view.
- The Performance report shows clicks, impressions, CTR and average position for up to 16 months.
- The Page indexing report and URL Inspection tool help you find and fix indexing problems.
- Check Search Console regularly, and set alerts so you hear about serious issues quickly.
Frequently asked questions
Is Google Search Console free?
Yes. Google Search Console is completely free for any website owner who can verify they own or manage the site.
Does using Search Console improve my rankings?
Not directly. It does not boost rankings on its own, but the data helps you find problems and opportunities that can improve your performance.
How often should I check Google Search Console?
A quick weekly look at the Performance and Page indexing reports is enough for most small sites. Google also emails verified owners about serious issues, such as manual actions or security problems.
Previous lesson: SEO ranking factors: what really helps pages rank on Google
Next lesson: GA4 for SEO: how to use Google Analytics 4 to measure organic traffic