The Google Search Console glossary.

The metrics

Impressions

How many times a result from your site appeared in Google Search. Counted when the result is shown, whether or not anyone scrolled to it or clicked.

Caveat Query-level impressions always under-count, because Google hides rare queries (see anonymized queries). Read volume from page-level and site totals, never by summing the query list.

How Search Console counts impressions, and what they hide

Clicks

How many times someone clicked from Google Search through to your site.

Caveat The same anonymization that hides rare queries also hides their clicks from the query view, so the per-query clicks you can see add up to less than your page total.

The four Search Console metrics, explained

Click-through rate (CTR)

also: clickthrough rate, CTR

Clicks divided by impressions, as a percentage. How often a shown result actually gets clicked.

Caveat CTR falls sharply when an AI Overview or featured snippet sits above you, even at the same position. A low CTR is often a SERP-layout problem, not a title problem.

Low CTR at a good position: title, or AI Overview?

Average position

The mean ranking of your result across all its impressions, where 1 is the top organic spot.

Caveat It is an average, so "position 8" can hide a page that ranks 3 for one query and 20 for another. Always read position per query, not just per page.

Why average position is misleading

Query

also: search query, keyword

The actual words a user typed into Google that your result appeared for. The query view is where search intent lives.

Caveat Rare queries are stripped out (see anonymized queries), so the query view is a sample of intent, not a complete count of traffic.

Reading the data honestly

Page-level vs query-level data

GSC reports the same traffic two ways: aggregated by page, and broken down by query. The two never reconcile.

Caveat Query-level always under-counts because hidden queries are removed from the query view but still counted in the page totals. Use page-level for volume, query-level for intent.

Read the full page-vs-query breakdown

Anonymized queries

also: hidden queries, anonymized search terms

Searches that too few people made get dropped from your query report to protect privacy. Their impressions and clicks still count in your page and site totals, just not against any named query.

Caveat This is the single reason the queries you can see never add up to your totals. It is expected behavior, not a bug or a tracking gap.

The privacy threshold behind anonymized queries

Data freshness

also: data lag

GSC data is typically one to three days behind. The most recent days keep filling in as Google finishes processing.

Caveat Judging "yesterday" too early reads as a drop that is really just unprocessed data. Compare complete days to complete days.

16-month retention

GSC keeps at most 16 months of performance data, then drops the oldest day every day.

Caveat There is no recovery after a day falls off and no delta export, so any year-over-year trend needs you to store your own snapshots before the window closes. This is why QueryScope keeps daily history for you.

Indexing and coverage

Index coverage

also: page indexing

Whether Google has stored your page in its index and can show it in results. A page can be crawled but not indexed, and only indexed pages can rank.

Caveat The full page-indexing report is in the GSC UI but is not exposed by any API, so tools reconstruct coverage from URL Inspection on the URLs they know about.

Crawled, currently not indexed

Google fetched the page but chose not to index it. Usually a quality or duplication signal, in Google's exact label "Crawled - currently not indexed".

Caveat There is no error to fix and no resubmit that helps. It is a judgment about the page, so the answer is a stronger, more distinct page.

Discovered, currently not indexed

Google knows the URL exists but has not crawled it yet, in Google's label "Discovered - currently not indexed". Often a crawl-budget or perceived-value signal.

Caveat At small scale this is usually patience, not a defect. At large scale it points to thin templated pages eating crawl budget.

URL Inspection

A GSC tool, and a read-only API, that reports how Google sees one specific URL: indexed or not, the canonical Google picked, and the last crawl date.

Caveat The API is read-only. It cannot force or request indexing; the separate Indexing API only covers job postings and broadcast events, not ordinary pages.

Canonical

also: canonical URL

The URL Google treats as the master copy among duplicate or near-duplicate pages. You declare one; Google may select a different one.

Caveat When the declared and Google-selected canonical disagree, Google's choice wins. Your declared canonical is a hint, not an instruction.

Appearance and experience

Search appearance

The special result formats your pages qualified for: rich results, FAQs, sitelinks, and more, broken out so you can see which formats drive clicks.

Caveat Qualifying is not the same as showing. Google decides per query whether to render the enhanced format.

Rich results

Search results enhanced with extra detail, such as ratings, FAQs, or breadcrumbs, drawn from the structured data on your page.

Caveat Valid schema makes a page eligible, not entitled. Eligibility can be revoked if Google judges the markup misleading.

Core Web Vitals (CWV)

also: CWV

Google's field-measured page-experience metrics from real Chrome users: loading (LCP), interactivity (INP), and visual stability (CLS), surfaced in GSC.

Caveat The report needs enough real traffic to populate, so low-traffic pages sit at "no data" rather than passing or failing.