How to Get Google to Index Your Website (2026 Guide)

To get your website to show up on Google, Google has to find it, crawl it and index it, and only then can it rank it. In practice: make sure nothing blocks Googlebot, add the site to Google Search Console, submit an XML sitemap, link every page you care about from a page Google already knows, and use Request indexing for the few URLs that matter most. Google finds most sites without any of this, and nobody can force it to index a page, but each step removes a reason for it not to.

The steps below come in the order you need them, with real config and Search Console's own labels. Getting indexed and ranking are different problems: if your pages are already indexed and still hard to find, the section on ranking near the end is the one you want.

Four stages between publishing and showing up

A page can stop at any stage without an error showing up anywhere else. Google describes three stages in How Google Search works; splitting discovery out of crawling shows which lever acts where.

Google also says it “doesn't guarantee that it will crawl, index, or serve your page”, and it doesn't accept payment to crawl a site more often or rank it higher. Every step below removes an obstacle or sends a clearer signal; there is no paid shortcut. For the vocabulary, see web indexing; for the crawler's side, see how Googlebot crawls and builds the index.

How to get your website to show up on Google, step by step

Step 1: Check whether Google already has your site

The quick check is a Google search for site:example.com with your own domain. Results mean at least some pages are indexed. No results for a site that has been live for a few weeks usually means Google hasn't found it or can't crawl it. Google notes that the operator doesn't necessarily return every indexed URL (Get your website on Google), so treat it as a sign of life, not a count. The site: search operator covers what it can and can't tell you.

The exact answer comes from Search Console, which step 3 sets up. Its URL Inspection tool reports URL is on Google or URL is not on Google for one URL, and gives Google's reason when a page isn't indexed. The Page indexing report groups every known URL of the site by those reasons. How to check if a page is indexed ranks the methods by reliability, and how to check indexed pages across a site covers the site-wide count.

Step 2: Remove anything that blocks Googlebot

Google's technical requirements for a page to be eligible for indexing are short: Googlebot isn't blocked, the page works (Google gets an HTTP 200), and the page has indexable content. Meeting them makes a page eligible, not indexed. When a site never shows up, check these first: the cause is often a setting left over from development.

robots.txt that disallows everything. A robots.txt left over from staging can tell every crawler to stay away from every URL:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /

For a site you want in Google, allow crawling and point to your sitemap:

User-agent: *
Allow: /

Sitemap: https://example.com/sitemap.xml

robots.txt controls crawling, not indexing. Google says it isn't a way to keep a page out of Google: a blocked URL can still appear in results, without a description, if other pages link to it (Introduction to robots.txt).

A noindex in the page or the headers. Either of these keeps a page out of the index, by design:

<!-- in the HTML <head> -->
<meta name="robots" content="noindex">

# or as an HTTP response header
X-Robots-Tag: noindex

The header form also covers PDFs and other non-HTML files. CMS settings that hide a site from search engines typically add one of the two, so check the live page's HTML and headers, not the template. One trap: Googlebot has to crawl a page to see its noindex, so if robots.txt blocks the URL the rule is never read (Block indexing with noindex). More in the noindex tag.

Login walls, errors and redirects. The same technical requirements say Googlebot won't crawl a page that requires a log-in to view it, so a password-protected preview has nothing to index. Google's crawler is also generally located in the US, which matters if content changes by country (SEO Starter Guide). Pages that answer 404 or 5xx, or show an error page with a 200 (a soft 404), are not indexed, and a URL that redirects is indexed under its target, if at all.

A canonical that points somewhere else. If a page declares another URL as its canonical, Google treats it as a duplicate and indexes the other one. A template that sets every canonical to the homepage does this site-wide. Redirects and rel="canonical" are strong signals, a sitemap entry is a weak one, and Google makes the final call (canonicalization). See the canonical tag.

Content that exists only after JavaScript runs. Google queues every page that returns 200 for rendering, so client-side content can be indexed, but it depends on that extra step, not all bots run JavaScript, and URL fragments such as /#/pricing can't be resolved reliably as separate pages. Google recommends server-side rendering or pre-rendering, and the History API for routing (JavaScript SEO basics). JavaScript SEO covers frameworks and single-page apps, and the technical SEO checklist orders every check by what blocks indexing first.

Step 3: Add your website to Google Search Console

Search Console is free, and you don't have to sign up for it to be included in Google Search (About Search Console). It is still the only place where Google tells you, URL by URL, whether a page is indexed and why not, and where you submit sitemaps and request indexing. It's the practical answer to how to add a website to Google.

1. Open the property selector in Search Console and choose Add property.
2. Pick a type. A Domain property (example.com) covers every subdomain and both http and https. A URL-prefix property (https://www.example.com/) covers only URLs that start with that exact prefix.
3. Verify ownership. A Domain property can only be verified with a DNS record at your domain name provider. A URL-prefix property also accepts an HTML file upload, an HTML tag, a Google Analytics tracking code or a Google Tag Manager container snippet.
4. Leave the verification in place: removing the DNS record or the file later loses verification.

The steps come from Google's help on adding a property and verifying ownership. If you control DNS, a Domain property is the safer choice, since it includes the www and protocol variants you might otherwise miss. Google Search Console: add a property compares the verification methods, and the URL Inspection tool explains every field it reports.

Step 4: Submit an XML sitemap

A sitemap lists the URLs you want crawled. Google says one isn't required and treats it as a hint, but it costs nothing and hands over many URLs at once. A minimal sitemap:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9">
  <url>
    <loc>https://example.com/</loc>
    <lastmod>2026-10-28</lastmod>
  </url>
  <url>
    <loc>https://example.com/pricing</loc>
    <lastmod>2026-10-12</lastmod>
  </url>
</urlset>

The rules that matter, from Google's guide to building a sitemap:

• One sitemap holds up to 50,000 URLs or 50 MB uncompressed. Split larger sites and list the files in a sitemap index.
• Use fully qualified, absolute URLs, and encode the file as UTF-8.
• lastmod is used only when it's consistently accurate, so change it when the main content, structured data or links change, not on every deploy. Google ignores priority and changefreq.
• List the URLs you want indexed: canonical pages that return 200, not redirects, duplicates or noindexed pages.

Submit it in two places: in Search Console's Sitemaps report (paste the URL into Add a new sitemap and click Submit), and as a Sitemap: line in robots.txt, which other search engines read too. The ping URL is gone: in June 2023 Google said the sitemaps ping endpoint would stop working six months later and return a 404 (see the sitemap ping deprecation).

A Success status in the Sitemaps report means Google read the file and queued its URLs for crawling. It doesn't mean they were crawled or will be indexed: the Sitemaps report help says there's no guarantee that a URL discovered in a sitemap has been or will be crawled or indexed. The sitemap XML guide covers the format, and how to submit a sitemap to Google walks through the report and its statuses.

Step 5: Link to every page you want indexed

Google primarily finds pages through links from pages it has already crawled (SEO Starter Guide), and its guide to crawlable links says every page you care about should have a link from at least one other page on your site.

The link has to be one Google can follow: generally an <a> element with an href.

<!-- Google can follow these -->
<a href="/docs/webhooks">Webhook docs</a>
<a href="https://example.com/docs/webhooks">Webhook docs</a>

<!-- Google can't reliably follow these -->
<span href="/docs/webhooks">Webhook docs</span>
<a onclick="goto('/docs/webhooks')">Webhook docs</a>

In practice: link each new page from pages that are already indexed (the homepage, a blog index, a docs sidebar), use descriptive anchor text, and look for sitemap URLs that nothing links to. Internal linking for SEO and orphan pages go deeper.

Links from other sites help Google discover a new domain, and Get your website on Google lists a site that no other site links to as a common reason it's missed. Earn them where they make sense, such as a launch post or a project README. Don't pay for them: Google says that could be considered a violation of its spam policies.

Step 6: Request indexing for the pages that matter

For a single new or changed page, Search Console's URL Inspection tool lets you ask for a crawl:

1. Paste the full URL into the Inspect any URL bar at the top of Search Console. The URL has to belong to the property you have open.
2. Read the result. URL is on Google means the page is indexed and eligible to appear, which isn't a promise that it will. URL is not on Google comes with the reason.
3. Optionally click Test live URL to check the current version. If the live test finds the page non-indexable, you can't request indexing for it.
4. Click Request indexing.

What to expect, from the URL Inspection tool help and Google's guide to asking Google to recrawl:

• You must be an owner or full user of the property, and you can only request URLs you manage.
• There is a daily limit on indexing requests. Google doesn't publish the number.
• Requesting the same URL several times doesn't get it crawled any faster.
• A request doesn't guarantee indexing. Crawling can take anywhere from a few days to a few weeks.
• For a large number of URLs, Google points you to a sitemap instead.

So Request indexing is for the few pages where timing matters: a launch page, a removed noindex, a rewrite. Request indexing in Search Console covers the quota and when a click is worth it, and how to submit a URL to Google compares the methods that still work.

One shortcut to skip: Google's Indexing API can only be used for pages with JobPosting, or a BroadcastEvent embedded in a VideoObject (Indexing API quickstart). Pushing blog posts or product pages through it is outside Google's documented use, and Google runs spam detection on every submission and can revoke access when the API is abused. The Google Indexing API explains what it is actually for.

Step 7: Give Google a reason to index the page

A crawlable page still has to be worth keeping. Google says not every page it processes gets indexed, and its Page indexing report help tells you not to expect every URL to be. The usual reasons are duplication (Google indexes one canonical URL per group of similar pages) and low content quality.

URL Inspection and the Page indexing report tell you which case you're in, in Google's words:

When Google crawled a page and passed it over, the fix is the page itself. Google's guide to helpful, reliable, people-first content is the reference. Each status has its own article, starting with crawled - currently not indexed and discovered - currently not indexed; the page indexing report lists them all. If you publish generated pages at scale, read whether Google indexes AI content.

How to get Google to index your site faster

Google sets the pace, and its own figures are broad. It can take a few weeks for Google to notice a new site (Get your website on Google), a requested crawl can take from a few days to a few weeks, and the URL Inspection help says indexing can take up to a week or two. The SEO Starter Guide puts the range for changes in general at a few hours to several months.

What shortens the wait is the list above, applied the day a page goes live: add it to the sitemap with an accurate lastmod, link it from pages Google already crawls, and request indexing if it's one of the few that matter. What doesn't help: requesting the same URL again, setting priority to 1.0 (Google ignores it), or calling the retired ping URL. How long it takes Google to index a page, how often Google crawls a site and Google indexing delays cover timing in detail.

What no tool can do

Some services sell “instant indexing” or guaranteed placement on Google. Google's documentation leaves no room for that: it guarantees neither crawling, indexing nor serving, and takes no payment for any of them. What indexing services can actually do falls into a few groups:

• Submit your sitemap or click Request indexing for you: the official levers, with the same quotas.
• Push URLs through the Indexing API: outside Google's documented use for anything but jobs and livestreams.
• Send IndexNow notifications: these reach Bing and other participating engines, not Google, which isn't on the list of IndexNow search engines (see does Google use IndexNow).
• Work on pages you don't own, such as third-party pages that link to you: that's what a backlink indexer is for, a different job from indexing your own site.

Instant indexing looks at those claims one by one, and the best Google indexing tools compares the options by category.

When an indexed site still doesn't show up on Google

If URL Inspection says URL is on Google and you still can't find the page, the question is ranking. Google ranks indexed pages programmatically using hundreds of factors, including the searcher's location, language and device, and an indexed page may simply not be relevant to the query you tried (How Google Search works).

• Search for the page's exact title or a distinctive sentence in quotes. If it shows up, the page is indexed and doesn't rank for broader queries yet.
• Open the Performance report in Search Console to see the queries the site already gets impressions for.
• For a local business, claim your Business Profile, which Google recommends for managing how the business appears in Search and Maps.

Site-level diagnosis is in why your website is not showing up on Google, and page-level triage for an established site is in Google not indexing new pages. When pages are indexed and stuck, read indexed but not ranking; when Google deindexed pages it used to show, read pages dropped from Google's index.

Bing, ChatGPT and other search engines

Bing has its own webmaster tools and takes part in IndexNow, a protocol for telling search engines that URLs were added, changed or deleted. A submission to one participating engine is shared with the others (IndexNow FAQ); as of October 2026 they are Bing, Yandex, Seznam.cz, Naver, Yep, the Internet Archive and Amazonbot. An accepted notification is not a crawl or an index entry. See Bing indexing, IndexNow and how to get your website on ChatGPT.

Guides by platform and situation

The steps are the same on every platform. Where the settings live is what differs.

• WordPress: how to index a WordPress site on Google
• Shopify: Shopify pages not indexed
• Site builders: Webflow SEO, Framer SEO, Wix website not showing up on Google, Squarespace website not showing up on Google, Carrd SEO
• Blogging platforms: Ghost SEO, Blogger indexing, Medium SEO
• No-code and docs tools: how to get a Google Site indexed, Bubble SEO, Notion website SEO
• Launching: new website SEO checklist
• Building a product: SEO for SaaS, SEO for startups, SEO for developers, SEO for indie hackers
• Keeping watch: SEO monitoring, index monitoring, SEO indexing reports for clients

What IndexCyborg automates in this workflow

You add the site, verify that you own the domain and connect Search Console once. IndexCyborg then runs the steps above for every page in your sitemaps:

It automates the official levers; it doesn't change what Google decides. A requested URL is queued for crawling, not indexed, an accepted IndexNow notification is not a crawl, and coverage is always stated against the pages actually inspected. The same data is in the dashboard, the REST API and an MCP server, so a coding agent can check indexing from your editor. The full list is on the features page.

Frequently asked questions