Google Search Console in plain language

What is Search Console, and how is it different from Google Analytics?

Many people mix up these two tools, yet the division of labor is simple. Search Console shows what happens BEFORE the visit: how you perform in Google's search results - impressions, clicks, rankings, indexing status. Google Analytics shows what happens AFTER the visit: what visitors do on your site, how long they stay, what they look at. The two complement each other, and both are free.

You can access Search Console at search.google.com/search-console with a Google account. Since mid-2025, the previously separate “Insights” view has been built into the interface, so you'll find the simplified summaries there as well.

The Performance report - the four numbers everyone looks at

At the top of the Performance report sit four colored tiles, and most misunderstandings stem from them - so it's worth understanding them precisely. A click counts how many times someone clicked through from a Google result to your page; only clicks that actually leave Google count, and if someone goes back and clicks the same link again, it still counts as one. An impression counts how many times your link appeared on the results page - and here comes the surprise: it counts even if the visitor never scrolled down that far. That's why you can have plenty of impressions with zero clicks, especially at the start.

CTR (click-through rate) is the ratio of the two: clicks divided by impressions. This is your “shop-window metric” - it tells you how appealing your title and description are compared to the other results. Average position is the most commonly misunderstood number: it's an average across all your keywords, so 14.2 can mean position 1 for one search and position 40 for another. We'll come back to this in the pitfalls section.

For reading the chart, remember a single rule: the data for the last 1-2 days is always partial. Google finalizes the numbers with a few days' delay, so the “drop” you see at the end of the line is almost never real - it fills in a few days later. If you want fresh, hour-by-hour data, the newer “24 hours” view can do that too.

Below the tiles you can view the table in several breakdowns - each is good for something different:

1. Queries: WHAT people searched for - this is where you'll find your title ideas and new content topics.
2. Pages: WHICH of your pages brings the traffic - and which doesn't, even though it should.
3. Countries and Devices: where and on what your visitors arrive - if most of them are on mobile, your site needs to be at its best on mobile.

Page indexing: are you even in Google at all?

Before we talk about any rankings, a page first has to get into Google's database - that's called indexing. Important: indexed does not mean it ranks well, only that it can appear in the results at all. The Page indexing report shows how many of your pages are in, and - more interestingly - why the rest aren't.

The two most common “not indexed” statuses sound similar but mean different things. “Discovered - currently not indexed” says: Google knows about the page but its crawler hasn't visited yet - for a new page this is completely normal, you just need patience. “Crawled - currently not indexed”, on the other hand, means the crawler has been there but has (for now) not added the page to the index. In that case even Google says resubmitting is pointless - strengthening the content can help.

Two more statuses are worth pausing on. “Duplicate with proper canonical tag” sounds scary, but it's usually fine - it indicates an intentional duplicate (a language variant, for example), so there's nothing to do. “Excluded by noindex tag”, however, means that someone - you or your system - has explicitly forbidden indexing. That's only a problem if it wasn't intentional, but do check it!

You can check the status of any specific page with the URL Inspection field at the top, and you can request indexing for a new page there as well. But be prepared: in Google's own words, “indexing is never instant” - even a request doesn't skip the queue.

How to add your own domain (step by step)

In Search Console you can create two kinds of “property”, and this is the first decision many people get wrong. A Domain property (e.g. pelda.hu) covers the entire domain: the www and non-www variants, http and https, even subdomains - you see everything in one place. A URL-prefix property (e.g. https://pelda.hu/), by contrast, only measures the exact matching address variant. For beginners, the Domain property is almost always the right choice; Google itself recommends it too.

Verifying a Domain property works one way: with a DNS TXT record. That sounds technical at first, but it's really just a copy-and-paste in your domain provider's admin panel:

1. In Search Console, click the “Add property” button and choose the Domain type.
2. Google gives you a unique code (google-site-verification=...) - copy it.
3. Log in to your domain provider's (registrar's) panel and add it as a new TXT record in the DNS settings.
4. Back in Search Console: “Verify”. If it doesn't go through the first time, don't panic - DNS propagation can take hours.
5. Once it succeeds, submit your sitemap right away: Sitemaps menu, then the address of your sitemap.xml. This helps Google find every one of your pages.

The most common pitfalls - and how to avoid them

The average-position trap. The most common scare: “my position is getting worse!” - while your site is actually improving. Position is an average: when Google starts showing you for new searches too, those new keywords start from the back (positions 20-40) and mathematically drag the average down. Your visibility grew, yet the number “got worse”. So never look at the average on its own: check position per keyword, and watch the trend of impressions - that's the real visibility metric.

The fresh-data trap. If you compare the “last 7 days” to the previous week, the most recent 1-2 days are still incomplete - the fresh period will always look undercounted. For comparisons, leave out the last few days or look at a longer range.

The hidden keywords. If you add up the clicks in the query table, you get less than the total clicks on the chart. That's not a bug: Google hides very rare searches from the table for privacy reasons, but still counts them in the totals.

The wrong address variant. With a URL-prefix property, the www and non-www addresses are two separate worlds - if you entered the wrong one, you'll see zero data and might think your site isn't working. With a Domain property this mistake simply can't happen.

The vanishing access. Verification only lives as long as the TXT record (or verification file) exists. When switching providers or DNS it's easy to delete it by accident - and if every owner's verification is lost, everyone loses access to the property. When you move, take the TXT record with you!

Impatience. For a new site, “0 clicks” in the first weeks is completely normal. The order is always the same: first indexing, then impressions in the back positions, and only after that - weeks later - the first clicks. If you're already seeing impressions, that's good news: you're in, and Google is showing you.

What to check regularly? The 10-minute monthly routine

You don't need to stare at the charts every day - weekly fluctuation is mostly noise. Once a month, though, it's worth going through these four points:

1. Performance, in the 3-month view: is the impressions trend growing? This is the most important early signal.
2. Top queries: is there a keyword with lots of impressions but a low CTR? A better title or description there can be an instant win.
3. Page indexing: has the number of “not indexed” pages suddenly jumped? If so, look into the reasons.
4. Security issues and Manual actions: these two menus should always be empty - if they're not, deal with it immediately.

Looking ahead: Search Console in the age of AI results

Google Search is transforming: more and more questions get answered with AI overviews ahead of the traditional list of results. Search Console is responding to this too - in 2026 the rollout of a dedicated AI performance report began, which will show how many times your content appeared in AI answers. For now the feature is available to only a few accounts and is arriving gradually for everyone; until then, impressions from AI results are included in the usual “Web” data.

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