How to Fix Google Indexing Issues Without Paid Tools: Get Your Pages Indexed

I remember the exact moment I opened Google Search Console and saw the number. 272 pages submitted. Zero indexed. Not a handful missing. Not “most are indexed, a few are pending.” Zero. Every single page I had written, optimized, and internally linked was invisible to Google.

The site wasn’t new. It had been live for weeks. The sitemap was submitted. The robots.txt was clean. Internal linking was solid. And yet, Google’s index contained exactly zero of my pages.

If you’re reading this, you’ve probably seen the same thing. You build a site, publish content, submit a sitemap, and then wait. And wait. And check GSC. And see “Crawled - currently not indexed” or “Discovered - currently not indexed” next to your URLs. Or worse — pages that were previously indexed have suddenly disappeared.

Indexing is the foundation of SEO. If Google hasn’t indexed your page, it doesn’t exist in search results. No amount of keyword optimization, backlink building, or content quality matters if the page isn’t in the index. It’s the ultimate gatekeeper.

This guide is a troubleshooting framework built from real experience — not theory. I’ve dealt with fresh sites that wouldn’t get crawled, established sites that lost indexing overnight, and everything in between. Everything here uses free tools: Google Search Console, Google Analytics, your browser, and a few command-line utilities.

Why Pages Don’t Get Indexed (And Why It’s Getting Harder)

First, some context that took me too long to understand.

Google doesn’t index everything it crawls. This is by design, not a bug. Google’s index has finite capacity, and the crawl-and-index pipeline is expensive. So Google makes triage decisions: for every URL it discovers, it asks “Is this worth indexing?” If the answer is no — or even “maybe later” — the page goes into limbo. It’s been crawled, Google knows it exists, but it’s not in the active index.

This triage has gotten more aggressive. In 2023-2024, Google’s “helpful content” updates and ongoing spam fighting have made the indexing bar higher, especially for new sites with low authority. Indie developers building new sites are hit hardest because you start with no trust signals — no backlinks, no domain age, no brand recognition.

Here are the main reasons pages don’t get indexed:

1. Low site quality signals. Google evaluates overall site quality before indexing individual pages. If your site has thin content, duplicate pages, or looks like a content farm, Google may crawl but decline to index. This is the most common cause and the hardest to fix.

2. Crawl budget waste. Google allocates a finite crawl budget to each site. If your site has hundreds of low-value URLs (tag pages, filter combinations, pagination, parameter URLs), Google wastes crawl budget on junk instead of discovering your important pages.

3. Technical barriers. robots.txt blocks, noindex tags, canonical chains, redirect loops, slow server response times, JavaScript-rendered content that Googlebot can’t execute — any of these can prevent indexing.

4. Orphan pages. If a page has no internal links pointing to it, Google may never discover it. Even if it’s in your sitemap, Google treats internal linking as a quality signal. Pages in the sitemap but not linked from anywhere are treated as low-priority.

5. Manual actions or penalties. If your site has been flagged for spam, unnatural links, or policy violations, Google may deindex pages or the entire site. This is rare but devastating when it happens.

6. Trust deficit. New domains, especially certain TLDs, start with a trust deficit. Google needs time and signals before it commits indexing resources. This isn’t a penalty — it’s a waiting period that you can shorten with the right signals.

Step 1: Diagnose the Problem in Google Search Console

Before you fix anything, you need to know exactly what’s happening. Google Search Console is your primary diagnostic tool.

Check the Page Indexing Report

Go to GSC > Pages (formerly “Coverage”). This report shows you the indexing status of every URL Google knows about. The key categories:

• Indexed: Good. The page is in Google’s index.
• Crawled - currently not indexed: Google crawled the page but chose not to index it. This usually means a quality issue — Google doesn’t think the page is worth indexing yet. This is the most frustrating status because the page is technically accessible, Google has seen it, and it still said no.
• Discovered - currently not indexed: Google knows the URL exists (from the sitemap or internal links) but hasn’t even crawled it yet. This usually means crawl budget issues or very low priority.
• Excluded by ‘noindex’ tag: A noindex tag is preventing indexing. Check your meta tags and HTTP headers.
• Excluded by robots.txt: Your robots.txt is blocking the page.
• Duplicate without user-selected canonical: Google found a duplicate and chose a different canonical URL than you specified.
• Duplicate, Google chose different canonical than user: Google thinks this page is a duplicate of another URL and is indexing that one instead.

For each status, GSC shows the specific URLs affected. Click into any category to see the list.

What I do first: Export the full list of “not indexed” URLs. Sort by category. The “Crawled - currently not indexed” bucket is where I focus most of my energy, because those pages are being seen and rejected. The fix usually involves improving content quality, internal linking, or removing duplicate content.

Use the URL Inspection Tool

For individual pages, the URL Inspection tool (the search bar at the top of GSC) gives you detailed diagnostics. Enter any URL and GSC tells you:

• Whether it’s indexed
• The last crawl date
• Any indexing errors
• The canonical URL Google chose
• Whether mobile-friendly
• Whether the page is eligible for rich results

The most useful action here is “Request Indexing.” When you click this, Google queues the URL for a fresh crawl. For new or updated pages, this can speed up indexing from weeks to days. Google rate-limits this feature — you get roughly 10-25 requests per day — so use it strategically on your most important pages.

My workflow: After publishing or significantly updating a page, I immediately request indexing through URL Inspection. I keep a spreadsheet of which pages I’ve requested and when, so I can track how long it takes Google to respond.

Check the Sitemap Report

Go to GSC > Sitemaps. This shows you the status of each submitted sitemap:

• Success: Google processed the sitemap and discovered URLs.
• Has errors: Something went wrong — malformed XML, URLs that return errors, or URLs blocked by robots.txt.

If your sitemap shows errors, click into it to see specifics. Common issues include URLs with 404 status, redirect chains, or URLs blocked by robots.txt that shouldn’t be.

Critical check: Compare the number of URLs in your sitemap to the number GSC reports as “discovered.” If your sitemap has 200 URLs but GSC only discovered 50, there’s a parsing issue with your sitemap format or a robots.txt conflict.

Step 2: Fix Technical Barriers

Technical issues are the easiest to fix and should be ruled out first. Here’s a systematic check.

Verify Your robots.txt Isn’t Blocking Important Pages

This sounds obvious, but I’ve seen it happen more than once. A overly aggressive robots.txt rule blocks entire sections of a site.

Check your robots.txt by visiting https://yoursite.com/robots.txt in your browser. Look for Disallow rules that might be catching more than intended.

Common mistake: Using Disallow: / in a staging or preview environment and forgetting to change it for production. Or using Disallow: /*? to block parameter URLs, which also blocks legitimate pages with query strings.

Free tool to verify: Google’s robots.txt Tester (in GSC under Legacy Tools, or use any online robots.txt checker). Enter a URL and it tells you whether it’s allowed or blocked.

Check for noindex Tags

A noindex meta tag tells Google not to index a page. These are useful for thank-you pages, search results, and filtered views — but disastrous when accidentally applied to important pages.

Check for noindex tags in two places:

1. Meta tag: <meta name="robots" content="noindex"> in the <head> of your HTML.
2. HTTP header: X-Robots-Tag: noindex in the response headers.

Free check: Open the page in Chrome, right-click and “View Page Source,” then Ctrl+F for “noindex.” Or use the URL Inspection tool in GSC, which will flag noindex issues.

Framework-specific gotcha: Many frameworks set noindex by default in certain modes. Astro sets noindex on preview deployments. Next.js sets it in some configurations. WordPress sets it site-wide when “Discourage search engines from indexing” is checked in Settings > Reading. Check your framework’s defaults.

Fix Canonical Tag Issues

Canonical tags (<link rel="canonical" href="...">) tell Google which version of a URL to index when duplicates exist. If your canonical tags are wrong, Google might index the wrong URL or skip indexing entirely.

Common problems:

1. Self-referencing canonical on non-canonical URLs: If page A canonicals to page B, but page B canonicals to page A, Google gets confused. Each page should canonical to itself (if it’s the canonical version) or to the correct canonical URL (one direction, no loops).

2. Canonical to a URL that returns 404 or redirects: If your canonical URL points to a page that doesn’t exist or redirects elsewhere, Google ignores the canonical and may index the wrong version.

3. Conflicting signals: If your canonical tag says one thing but your sitemap lists a different URL, or your internal links point to yet another variation, Google gets mixed signals and may make its own decision.

Free check: Use the URL Inspection tool. It shows the “Google-selected canonical” vs. your “User-declared canonical.” If they differ, there’s a conflict to resolve.

My rule: Every page has exactly one canonical URL. The canonical URL matches the URL in the browser address bar. The sitemap lists canonical URLs only. Internal links point to canonical URLs. No trailing-slash mismatches (pick one convention — with or without trailing slash — and stick to it everywhere).

Ensure Server Response Times Are Fast Enough

Googlebot has a timeout. If your server takes too long to respond, Googlebot gives up and moves on. Pages that consistently time out won’t get crawled, let alone indexed.

Free check: Google PageSpeed Insights measures server response time (Time to First Byte). Anything over 2 seconds is problematic for crawling. Over 5 seconds, and Googlebot may stop crawling your site entirely.

For static sites on Cloudflare Pages, Vercel, or Netlify, this is rarely an issue. For dynamic sites with database queries or server-side rendering, check your TTFB and optimize if needed.

Command-line check:

curl -o /dev/null -s -w "Time to First Byte: %{time_starttransfer}s\nTotal: %{time_total}s\nHTTP Status: %{http_code}\n" https://yoursite.com/page-url

Run this for several pages. If TTFB is consistently above 2 seconds, that’s a crawl problem.

Step 3: Fix Crawl Budget Issues

Crawl budget is the number of pages Googlebot will crawl on your site within a given timeframe. For small sites (under 10,000 pages), crawl budget is rarely the issue. But it can still matter if you’re wasting it on junk URLs.

Identify Crawl Budget Waste

Free method: Check GSC > Settings > Crawl Stats. This report shows:

• Total crawl requests per day
• Average response time
• Breakdown by purpose (Googlebot type)
• Hostname and file type breakdown

If Googlebot is spending a disproportionate amount of time crawling parameter URLs, faceted navigation pages, or duplicate content, you’re wasting crawl budget.

Another free method: Look at your server logs. If you have access to access logs, grep for Googlebot:

grep "Googlebot" /var/log/nginx/access.log | awk '{print $7}' | sort | uniq -c | sort -rn | head -30

This shows the top 30 URLs Googlebot requested and how many times each was crawled. If you see parameter URLs, tag pages, or other low-value pages in the top of this list, you’re wasting crawl budget.

Block Low-Value URLs from Crawling

Use robots.txt to prevent Googlebot from wasting crawl budget on URLs that should never be indexed:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /*?sort=
Disallow: /*?filter=
Disallow: /*?page=
Disallow: /search?
Disallow: /tag/
Disallow: /author/

Be careful not to block URLs that have search value. Test each block in the robots.txt Tester before deploying.

Clean Up Redirect Chains

Redirect chains waste crawl budget. If URL A redirects to B, which redirects to C, which redirects to D, Googlebot follows the chain and uses four requests instead of one.

Free check: Use curl to check for redirect chains:

curl -L -o /dev/null -s -w "Final URL: %{url_effective}\nRedirects: %{num_redirects}\n" https://yoursite.com/old-page

If num_redirects is more than 1, you have a chain. Update the first redirect to point directly to the final destination.

Remove Orphan Pages

An orphan page is a URL in your sitemap that has no internal links pointing to it. Google discovers it from the sitemap but treats it as low-priority because no other page on your site considers it important enough to link to.

Free check: For each URL in your sitemap, search for it in your site’s internal links. The simplest way is to use a free crawler like Screaming Frog (free up to 500 URLs) and check the “Inlinks” column. Pages with zero inlinks are orphans.

Fix: Add at least 2-3 internal links to each important page from other relevant pages. This signals to Google that the page matters and also helps distribute PageRank.

Step 4: Improve Content Quality Signals

If you’ve ruled out technical issues and crawl budget waste, the remaining problem is likely content quality. Google’s indexing decision is fundamentally a quality assessment. Here’s what I’ve learned about what Google considers “worth indexing.”

Ensure Every Page Has Substantial, Unique Content

Google is reluctant to index thin pages. What counts as “thin” varies, but in my experience, pages with under 300 words of unique content are at high risk of being crawled but not indexed. Pages with 800+ words of genuinely useful content get indexed much faster.

The “unique” part matters as much as the word count. If your page is mostly boilerplate — navigation, footer, sidebar — with a paragraph of actual content, Google sees it as thin even if the total HTML is large.

I had a site where 40% of pages were short tag archive pages with 2-3 sentences and a list of links. Google crawled every one and indexed none. After I added 200+ words of descriptive content to each tag page, 70% were indexed within two weeks. The content wasn’t brilliant — it was genuinely useful descriptions of what the tag covered and why the linked articles were relevant. But it was enough to signal “this page has value.”

Remove or Consolidate Duplicate Content

Google won’t index multiple pages with substantially identical content. If you have slight variations of the same page (print versions, mobile versions, sorted versions), Google picks one and ignores the rest.

Free check: Pick a random paragraph from each page and search for it in quotes on Google. If multiple pages on your site show up for the same text, you have duplication.

Fix: Either remove the duplicates (redirect them to the canonical version) or add enough unique content to differentiate them. Use canonical tags to specify which version should be indexed.

Build Topical Authority Through Content Clusters

Google indexes pages more eagerly when they’re part of a topical cluster. A single article about “keyword research” might struggle to get indexed. But if you have five interconnected articles about keyword research — a pillar guide, plus specific subtopics — Google sees topical depth and is more likely to index the entire cluster.

The mechanism: When Google crawls an article and finds internal links to related articles on the same topic, it treats the topic as one the site covers in depth. This is a quality signal that improves indexing probability for all pages in the cluster.

Practical approach: Instead of publishing standalone articles, plan content in clusters of 3-7 related pieces. Create a pillar page that links to all of them. Have each sub-article link back to the pillar and to at least 2 other articles in the cluster. This internal linking structure does double duty: it helps Google understand your topical authority and ensures no page is an orphan.

Update Stale Content

Pages that haven’t been updated in months signal to Google that the site may be abandoned. Googlebot reduces crawl frequency for sites that don’t update regularly.

My cadence: I update my top 10 pages at least once a month. “Update” doesn’t mean a rewrite — adding a new section, updating statistics, fixing a broken link, or expanding a section counts. The key is that the page’s last-modified header changes, signaling freshness.

Step 5: Get Discovered Faster

For new sites or new pages, you want Google to discover and crawl them as quickly as possible. Here are the free methods that actually work.

Submit a Clean Sitemap

Your XML sitemap is the single most important discovery signal. Make sure it:

1. Contains only canonical URLs — no redirects, no duplicates, no parameter URLs.
2. Is accessible at a predictable location — /sitemap.xml or /sitemap-index.xml.
3. Is submitted in GSC — go to Sitemaps, enter the URL, and click Submit.
4. Is referenced in robots.txt — add Sitemap: https://yoursite.com/sitemap.xml so crawlers find it automatically.

Astro-specific tip: Astro generates a sitemap automatically with the @astrojs/sitemap integration. But if you have a sitemap index file (sitemap-index.xml), submit that instead of the individual sitemap files. Google handles index files natively.

Use IndexNow for Instant Notification

IndexNow is a free protocol that lets you notify search engines (Bing, Yandex, Naver, Seznam) about new or updated URLs instantly. Google doesn’t support IndexNow yet, but Bing does — and Bing referrals are still traffic.

How it works:

1. Generate a key (any UUID will do).
2. Host a text file at https://yoursite.com/{key}.txt containing the key.
3. Send a POST request to https://api.indexnow.org/indexnow with your URL list.

Free submission script:

import urllib.request, json

SITE = "yoursite.com"
KEY = "your-uuid-here"
urls = ["https://yoursite.com/new-page", "https://yoursite.com/updated-page"]

payload = json.dumps({
    "host": SITE,
    "key": KEY,
    "keyLocation": f"https://{SITE}/{KEY}.txt",
    "urlList": urls
}).encode()

req = urllib.request.Request(
    "https://api.indexnow.org/indexnow",
    data=payload,
    headers={"Content-Type": "application/json"},
    method="POST"
)
resp = urllib.request.urlopen(req, timeout=15)
print(f"IndexNow: {resp.status}")

This takes 2 minutes to set up and notifies Bing within minutes instead of weeks.

Build Internal Links from Indexed Pages

The fastest way to get a new page crawled is to link to it from a page that Google already crawls regularly. Googlebot follows links — if it’s crawling page A every day and page A links to page B, page B gets discovered quickly.

Free check: In GSC, look at your most-crawled pages (Pages report, sorted by impressions). These are the pages Google visits most frequently. Add links to your new pages from these high-traffic pages.

My approach: Every time I publish a new article, I add a link to it from at least 2 existing articles that are already indexed and receiving traffic. This isn’t just good for SEO — it’s genuinely useful for readers who want to explore related topics.

Get External Links (Even a Few)

A single external link from an indexed page is often enough to trigger discovery. Google finds new URLs by following links from pages it already knows about.

Free methods that work:

• Share your URL on social media (Twitter/X, LinkedIn, Reddit) — Google crawls social platforms and follows links.
• Publish on platforms that allow links back to your site (Dev.to, Medium, Hashnode, GitHub READMEs).
• Participate in relevant online communities and share genuinely useful content.
• Submit your site to free directories that are actually curated (avoid spammy directory lists).

One quality external link from a relevant, indexed page is worth more than a hundred links from low-quality directories. I’ve seen pages get indexed within 24 hours of getting a single link from a moderately authoritative site.

Step 6: Recover from Indexing Drops

If your pages were previously indexed and suddenly disappeared, that’s a different problem from “never indexed.” Here’s how to diagnose and recover.

Check for Manual Actions

Go to GSC > Security & Manual Actions > Manual actions. If Google has applied a manual penalty, it will be listed here with details about what triggered it and how to fix it.

Manual actions are serious but fixable. The most common types for indie sites:

• Spammy content: Thin, scraped, or auto-generated content. Fix by removing or substantially improving the content, then request reconsideration.
• Unnatural links: Paid or manipulative backlinks. Fix by disavowing the bad links and documenting your cleanup effort.
• Social engineering / phishing: If your site has been flagged as deceptive. Fix by removing any elements Google considers misleading, then submit a reconsideration request.

The reconsideration request process: Write a detailed, honest explanation of what happened, what you fixed, and how you’ll prevent it in the future. Google’s reviewers are human and respond to genuine effort, not excuses. Include specific URLs you fixed and screenshots if relevant. Typical response time is 2-4 weeks.

Check for Core Algorithm Updates

Sometimes indexing drops aren’t your fault — they’re the result of a Google algorithm update. Check SEO news sites or Google’s Search Status dashboard for recent updates that may have affected your site.

If an algorithm update caused your indexing drop, the fix is to improve overall site quality — there’s no quick recovery for algorithmic changes. Focus on the fundamentals: better content, better user experience, better technical SEO.

Check for Server or Hosting Issues

If your server was down or your SSL certificate expired during a Googlebot crawl, Google may have temporarily deindexed affected pages. These usually recover automatically within a few days of the server coming back online, but you can speed it up by requesting indexing through URL Inspection.

Monitor with Google Search Console Alerts

GSC sends email alerts for critical issues: manual actions, sharp traffic drops, indexing errors, and security issues. Make sure your email address is verified and you have notifications enabled in GSC settings.

My practice: I check GSC at least once a week — not just the Pages report, but also Security issues, Manual actions, and Core Web Vitals. A 5-minute weekly check catches problems before they compound.

Step 7: Build a Sustainable Indexing Workflow

Prevention is easier than recovery. Here’s the workflow I follow to keep pages getting indexed consistently.

For Every New Page:

1. Write substantial content (800+ words of genuinely useful, unique content).
2. Set the correct canonical tag (self-referencing if it’s the only version).
3. Add 2-3 internal links from existing indexed pages.
4. Ensure the page is in the sitemap (automatically if using a CMS or static site generator).
5. Request indexing through GSC URL Inspection.
6. Submit via IndexNow for Bing.
7. Share the URL on at least one external platform for a backlink signal.

Weekly Maintenance:

1. Check GSC Pages report — monitor the “not indexed” bucket for changes.
2. Request indexing for any important pages that are crawled but not indexed.
3. Update at least 1-2 existing pages to signal freshness.
4. Check for new crawl errors in the Pages report.

Monthly Audit:

1. Review the full “not indexed” list — are there patterns? (All tag pages? All short pages? All from a specific section?)
2. Check for redirect chains using the curl method above.
3. Verify robots.txt hasn’t changed unexpectedly.
4. Review internal linking — are there new orphan pages?
5. Check sitemap health — are all URLs returning 200 and matching canonicals?

Common Mistakes I’ve Made (So You Don’t Have To)

Mistake 1: Panicking and making drastic changes. When I saw 0 indexed pages for the first time, I immediately rewrote half my content, changed my URL structure, and submitted reconsideration requests. In reality, the site just needed more time. New domains can take 4-8 weeks to get their first pages indexed. Making drastic changes during this period can actually slow things down by resetting Google’s quality evaluation.

Mistake 2: Submitting the sitemap repeatedly. Submitting the same sitemap multiple times doesn’t speed up indexing. Google processes the sitemap once and then crawls at its own pace. Resubmitting is only useful when you’ve added new URLs or fixed errors.

Mistake 3: Requesting indexing on every page every day. Google rate-limits indexing requests, and excessive requests may be treated as spam. I use my daily quota on the 2-3 most important new or updated pages and let the rest happen naturally.

Mistake 4: Ignoring Bing and other search engines. Bing has 3-5% of search market share — small, but not zero. More importantly, Bing indexes new sites much faster than Google. Getting indexed on Bing first can provide early traffic signals that eventually help with Google. IndexNow makes Bing submission instant and free.

Mistake 5: Assuming “crawled” means “indexed.” These are different stages. Crawled means Googlebot fetched the page. Indexed means Google decided to include it in search results. Many pages get crawled but never indexed. Don’t celebrate when you see crawl activity in your logs — celebrate when GSC shows the page as indexed.

Mistake 6: Blocking JavaScript-rendered content. If your site uses client-side rendering (React, Vue, etc.) and important content loads via JavaScript, Googlebot may not see it. Google has gotten better at rendering JavaScript, but it’s still delayed and imperfect. If critical content isn’t in the initial HTML response, use server-side rendering or pre-rendering. I learned this the hard way when a Next.js site had all its content rendered client-side and Google indexed blank pages for weeks.

Mistake 7: Creating hundreds of low-quality pages. One of my sites had 400+ pages, but most were thin (under 200 words). Google crawled the whole site but indexed only 30 pages. After consolidating the thin pages into 50 comprehensive ones, the indexed count jumped to 45 within a month. Fewer, better pages outperformed many shallow ones.

Tools Summary: Everything You Need Is Free

Tool	Purpose	Cost
Google Search Console	Indexing status, URL inspection, sitemap submission, manual actions	Free
URL Inspection Tool	Check individual page indexing status, request indexing	Free
Bing Webmaster Tools	Bing indexing status, submit URLs to Bing	Free
IndexNow Protocol	Instant URL submission to Bing, Yandex, Naver	Free
Google PageSpeed Insights	TTFB, Core Web Vitals, mobile-friendliness	Free
Chrome DevTools	View page source, check meta tags, inspect HTML	Free
Screaming Frog (free tier)	Crawl your site like Googlebot, find orphans and errors	Free (500 URLs)
curl	Check redirects, headers, response times	Free

Total cost: $0. Total tools: 8. The key insight is that GSC alone gives you 80% of the diagnostic power you need. The other tools fill specific gaps.

The Bottom Line

Indexing problems are solvable. The framework is straightforward:

1. Diagnose using GSC’s Pages report and URL Inspection.
2. Fix technical barriers — robots.txt, noindex tags, canonical issues, slow response times.
3. Optimize crawl budget — block junk URLs, fix redirect chains, eliminate orphans.
4. Improve quality signals — substantial unique content, topical clusters, fresh updates.
5. Accelerate discovery — clean sitemaps, IndexNow, internal links from indexed pages, external links.
6. Recover from drops — check manual actions, algorithm updates, server issues.
7. Build a sustainable workflow — per-page checklist, weekly maintenance, monthly audit.

The hardest part of indexing isn’t the technical work. It’s the patience. New sites take time to earn Google’s trust. Pages that are “crawled but not indexed” today may index next week or next month as your site builds authority. The temptation to panic and make drastic changes is strong — resist it. Fix the fundamentals, submit your pages, build quality content and links, and let Google’s timeline play out.

Here’s what I’d tell you if we were in the same room: pick your 5 most important pages. Make sure each one has 800+ words of genuinely useful content, correct canonical tags, 3+ internal links from existing pages, and no technical issues. Request indexing on all 5 through GSC. Submit them via IndexNow for Bing. Then wait 2 weeks and check back.

If they’re indexed, expand to 10 pages. If not, re-read the diagnostic steps above and look for what you missed. The answer is always in GSC — you just have to know where to look and what the statuses mean.

Fixing indexing issues isn’t glamorous work, but it’s the foundation everything else in SEO is built on. No index, no traffic. Get this right first.