Why is Google not indexing my site? 8 causes and fixes

You launched your site, weeks went by, and Google still isn't showing it. There's almost always a specific cause, and it's usually technical. Here are the 8 I see most often, with real cases from my own projects and from sites I've audited.

First: confirm the problem

Before changing anything, check what Google actually sees. Search Google for "site:yourdomain.com" to see which pages show up. Then open the Pages report in Search Console: there, Google explains page by page why it didn't index each address ("Excluded by 'noindex' tag", "Alternate page with proper canonical tag", "Crawled, currently not indexed"...). That reason tells you which of the causes below to look at.

Causes 1 to 3: you're telling Google no

1. A forgotten "noindex" tag

During development it's normal to ask Google not to index the site. The problem is forgetting to remove it at launch. Look for this in the page source (Ctrl+U):

<meta name="robots" content="noindex">

2. robots.txt: blocking is not the same as "noindex"

robots.txt tells Google not to visit an address, but it doesn't stop it from indexing it. On FindYourNeurotype, some demo PDFs were blocked in robots.txt and Search Console reported them as "Indexed, though blocked by robots.txt". The fix was to remove the block and send this HTTP header instead, which Google can only read if it's allowed to fetch the file:

X-Robots-Tag: noindex

3. A canonical pointing somewhere else

At a commercial cleaning company in Houston whose site I audited, every page declared the builder's temporary subdomain as its official address instead of the .com. Google had only 4 pages indexed. I go into detail in sites built with AI: why Google can't see them.

Causes 4 and 5: Google sees no reason to index

4. Duplicate content

On Parcelas Patagonia, a land and property portal, the descriptions coming from the brokers' feed were identical to those on other portals, and Google wasn't indexing those listings. The fix: rewrite them as unique text while strictly keeping the facts.

5. A new domain with no authority or links

Parcelas Patagonia's .cl domain had only its homepage indexed after 12 months. After moving to the .com with 301 redirects, Google indexed the first pages the very next day. I'm not claiming the domain change alone explains everything, but that's what happened.

Causes 6 to 8: technical problems

6. Duplicate URLs and soft 404s

On this very site, jeromestephan.com, URLs ending in ".html" or "/" answered "200" as duplicate pages instead of redirecting. I fixed it with 301 redirects. In the Houston case, non-existent pages answered "200" instead of 404, and Google kept old addresses.

7. A slow server

Slow pages get crawled less. In that case, the work was done on the database.

8. A firewall blocking Googlebot

An overly strict security filter can answer "403" to Googlebot, and that can drop your site from Google. On my sites, legitimate search engines and AI crawlers are exempt from rate limiting.

What to do now

1. In Google Search Console, use URL inspection and then "Request indexing". I explain it in Google Search Console step by step.
2. Submit your sitemap in Search Console.
3. Add the site to Bing Webmaster Tools and enable IndexNow to report every change.
4. Be patient: indexing takes days to weeks, and Google doesn't guarantee it will index everything.

In short

When Google doesn't index a site, it's rarely bad luck: it's usually a tag, a file or a setting that shuts the door. To find out what's going on with yours, see what I check in a free website audit (in Spanish) or have a look at my SEO service.