A technical SEO audit checks that search engines can crawl, render and index your site without obstacles.
It is the foundation under your content. Great pages cannot rank if crawlers cannot reach them.
1. Check crawlability
Confirm crawlers can reach your pages and that robots.txt blocks nothing important. A robots-blocked URL may still be indexed, but Google cannot inspect its current content.
2. Review indexing
In Search Console, compare submitted versus indexed pages. A big gap points to a technical problem.
3. Test speed and mobile
Use PageSpeed Insights and real mobile-browser testing. Distinguish field Core Web Vitals from lab diagnostics; passing a performance test does not guarantee rankings.
4. Fix structure issues
Look for broken links, redirect chains, duplicate titles and missing canonicals. These quietly drain performance.
5. Validate structured data
Validate any structured data that is relevant to the page. Valid markup can support eligible features, but does not guarantee a rich result or AI citation.
Good to know: Run a full audit quarterly, and a quick crawl check after any big site change.
What trips people up
- Ignoring access. Crawl blocks prevent inspection of the content; noindex separately controls indexing when Google can read it.
- Skipping mobile. Google indexes the mobile version of your site.
- Auditing once. Technical debt creeps back; schedule re-checks.
Further reading: Google technical requirements.