How Long Does Google Take to Index a Page?
Anywhere from a few hours to several weeks, and sometimes never. For an established site with regular publishing and good internal linking, a few hours to a few days is normal. For a new site with no links, several weeks is normal, and a proportion of pages will not be indexed at all.
The range is wide because it is not really a question about time. It is a question about priority.
What decides where you land in that range
Site authority. Google crawls established, linked-to sites more frequently. A new domain with no external links starts at the back.
Publishing frequency. Google learns your rhythm. A site that publishes daily gets checked far more often than one that publishes twice a year.
Internal links. A page linked from your homepage is found faster than one buried four clicks deep. An orphan page may not be found at all.
Crawl demand. Google's assessment of whether your content is worth fetching. Circular and frustrating, but real.
Page quality. Speed matters. So does whether Google can read the page without executing JavaScript. Client-rendered pages sit in a rendering queue that adds days.
Rough expectations
| Situation | Typical time to index |
|---|---|
| Established site, well linked, new post | Hours to 2 days |
| Established site, deep page, few internal links | 1 to 4 weeks |
| New site, some external links | 1 to 4 weeks |
| New site, no external links | 4 weeks to never |
| Existing page, substantially updated | Days to weeks, if noticed at all |
That last row surprises people. Updating a page does not reliably trigger a recrawl. Google recrawls on its own schedule and may not notice your change for a long time.
What actually speeds it up
Link to it. From the homepage if it matters. This is the single most effective thing you can do and it costs nothing.
Request indexing in Search Console. Fast for individual pages, capped at roughly ten to twenty a day.
Keep your sitemap current. Helps discovery, does not force anything.
Get an external link. A single link from a site Google crawls frequently can pull a new page in within hours.
What does not speed it up
Requesting indexing repeatedly for the same URL. Google is explicit that it makes no difference.
Pinging services and paid "instant indexing" tools that promise guaranteed results. Nobody can guarantee indexing. Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling you a promise they have no ability to keep.
The question behind the question
Most people searching this are not curious about the average. They have a page that is not indexed and want to know when to start worrying.
Rough guide: if an important page on an established site is not indexed after two weeks, something is wrong and it is worth diagnosing rather than waiting. Google not indexing your pages covers the nine causes.
If it turns out nothing is wrong and Google simply has not prioritised it, waiting is not much of a strategy. Daily Indexing keeps your sitemap current so Google can discover eligible pages, and sends change notifications to Bing and compatible services through IndexNow — every day, so a page that was deprioritised today is back in a current sitemap tomorrow. See how to index your website on Google for the full set of routes, or check which of your pages are missing.
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