Technical SEO Audit Checklist: 20 Things Every Business Website Should Check

An SEO technical audit checklist with 20 checks for crawling, indexing, redirects, mobile and speed, based on Google’s own documentation.

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An SEO technical audit checks whether search engines can reach, read and index your website, and these 20 checks cover what most business sites need. You can run nearly all of them with a free Search Console account and a phone.

What is an SEO technical audit?

An SEO technical audit is a review of how your site works for search engines, separate from what your pages say or who links to them. It answers a narrow question: if someone searched for exactly what you do, would Google be able to show your page? Start in Search Console, and use the URL Inspection tool to see how Google treats any single address.

The crawl path

Where a crawler gets stuck on a typical business website

  1. 1A section blocked in robots.txtThe crawler stops at the rule, so nothing past it gets read.
  2. 2A noindex tag on a service pageOften left over from a staging site. The page can’t appear in results.
  3. 3An orphan pageNo internal link points to it, so a crawler following links won’t arrive.
  4. 4A link to a missing pageCrawlers and visitors both hit a dead end, usually after a page was removed.
  5. 5A temporary redirect on a permanent moveGoogle may keep showing the old address in results.
A made-up site, drawn to show each fault once. Solid gold pages can be reached and indexed; the numbered ones need attention.

Crawling checks: can Google reach your pages?

Google can only rank what it can reach, so the first five checks follow the path a crawler takes through your site.

  1. robots.txt doesn’t block pages you want found

    Open yoursite.com/robots.txt and read each Disallow rule. A leftover Disallow: / from a staging site shuts crawlers out entirely. Google’s robots.txt guide covers the format.

  2. An XML sitemap exists and Google has it

    Look for a sitemap at /sitemap.xml or listed in robots.txt, then confirm in Search Console that it was submitted and read without errors.

  3. The sitemap lists only pages you want in search

    Use full, canonical addresses. Google’s limit is 50MB uncompressed or 50,000 URLs per file, and it ignores the priority and changefreq values, so don’t spend time on those.

  4. Navigation uses real links

    Google generally needs an <a> element with an href to follow a link. Menus built from buttons with click handlers can hide whole sections.

  5. Every important page has an internal link

    Google says every page you care about should have a link from at least one other page on your site. Compare your sitemap with your menus and look for pages nothing points to.

Indexing checks: which pages can appear in results?

A page Google has crawled still has to be indexed. Checks 6 to 11 look for the settings and signals that keep it out.

  1. Your most important pages are indexed

    Open the Page Indexing report. Google’s stated goal is “the canonical version of every important page indexed,” and it tells you not to expect every URL to be. Read the reasons for the rest and fix the ones that matter.

  2. No stray noindex tags

    Check your main pages for a noindex meta tag or HTTP header. This is the classic leftover after a redesign, and a single checkbox can take a site’s service pages out of search.

  3. Pages with noindex aren’t blocked in robots.txt

    Google has to crawl a page to see the noindex rule. If robots.txt blocks it, the rule goes unread and the address can still show up in results.

  4. Canonical tags point to the right page

    Each page should carry an absolute, self-referencing canonical, and duplicates should point to the main version. Google advises against using robots.txt or noindex for this job.

  5. Only one version of the site loads

    Try the http, https, www and non-www addresses. All of them should end up at one version through a permanent redirect.

  6. Missing pages return a real 404

    Visit a made-up address on your site. It should show an error page and return a 404 status. A “not found” message sent with a 200 status is a soft 404, which Search Console reports in the Page Indexing report.

Redirect and metadata checks: does each page explain itself?

Redirects and page metadata tell Google where content lives and what it’s about.

  1. Moved pages use permanent redirects

    With a permanent redirect, Google shows the new address in results. With a temporary one, it may keep showing the old address. Check any address that changed in your last redesign.

  2. Titles are unique and descriptive

    Google’s advice is distinct, concise text for each page, with no keyword stuffing or repeated boilerplate. A homepage titled only “Home” is a common miss.

  3. Structured data passes the Rich Results Test

    If you use structured data, test it and watch the status reports in Search Console. Passing makes a page eligible for enhanced results and doesn’t promise them.

Mobile and rendering checks: what does Google see?

Google indexes and ranks the mobile version of your site, so your phone is the fairest test of what it sees.

  1. Mobile pages hold the same content as desktop

    Google asks for the same content, headings, structured data and robots tags on both. Anything you cut on phones may as well not exist for search.

  2. Main content doesn’t depend on JavaScript alone

    Use URL Inspection to compare the rendered HTML with what you expect. Google can run JavaScript, and it still calls server-side rendering or pre-rendering “a great idea,” since not all bots can run it.

Speed and security checks: how does the page behave?

The last four checks measure how the page behaves for real visitors. The three speed checks use the thresholds Google publishes on web.dev.

  1. Largest Contentful Paint is 2.5 seconds or less

    LCP times how long the main content takes to load. web.dev’s target applies at the 75th percentile of page loads, split by mobile and desktop. Oversized images are the first place we look.

  2. Interaction to Next Paint is 200 milliseconds or less

    A slow score here means the page is slow to respond when someone taps or clicks. Heavy scripts, including stacked marketing tags, are a frequent cause.

  3. Cumulative Layout Shift is 0.1 or less

    Layout shift is how much the page jumps around while it loads. Give images and ad slots set dimensions, so that text doesn’t move under someone’s thumb.

  4. Every page loads over HTTPS

    Check for certificate warnings and for old http links inside your pages. Search Console has an HTTPS report that shows what to fix.

Which technical SEO problems should you fix first?

Fix the problems that keep pages out of Google first, then redirects and duplicates, and leave speed tuning until those are done.

A stray noindex on your main service page costs more than any slow image, so checks 1 and 7 come before everything else. Google says Core Web Vitals are used by its ranking systems, and also that good scores alone don’t guarantee top rankings and that chasing a perfect score just for SEO isn’t worth it. You can also skip crawl budget on a small site, since Google’s guide is aimed mainly at sites with 10,000 or more pages changing daily, or a million or more changing weekly.

Your site may pass most of this already. In our study of local business websites, only 49 of the 1,206 sites we analyzed lacked working HTTPS, and only 38 had no mobile viewport tag. If yours fails several checks at once, read whether the site needs a redesign before patching it. After a website redesign, run the whole list again.

If you’d like someone else to do it, our technical SEO audit service ends in a ranked list of fixes your own developer can follow, quoted after we’ve seen the site. To see how an audit fits a wider budget, read what small business SEO costs. Local businesses should pair this list with our Business Profile guide, and if AI search is on your mind, getting found on ChatGPT covers that side.

Frequently asked questions

How often should I run a technical SEO audit?
Run one before and after a redesign or platform move, whenever traffic drops without an obvious cause, and otherwise about once a year for a small site. Glance at the Page Indexing report in Search Console more often.
Can I do a technical SEO audit myself?
Mostly, yes. Search Console covers crawling and indexing, and Google’s Rich Results Test checks structured data. You may need a developer to fix what you find, especially on rendering and speed.
Will fixing technical problems improve my rankings?
It can if a problem was keeping pages out of Google. Nobody can promise a result. Google says good Core Web Vitals scores alone don’t guarantee top rankings, and a technically clean site still needs useful pages.
Do small websites need to worry about crawl budget?
Usually not. Google aims its crawl budget guide at sites with a million or more pages changing weekly, or 10,000 or more changing daily, and calls those numbers rough estimates. Keeping your sitemap current is enough for most small sites.

Work with PageSimple

Have us run the audit.

Share your website, your Google Business Profile and any Search Console or analytics setup. We’ll look it over and send a fixed quote for the audit and any fixes.

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Sources

All pages checked November 1, 2026. Update dates are the ones each page shows.