Huge drop off in Google "indexed" pages after switching to HTTPS, should I switch back to HTTP?
Solution 1
What I would suggest in your case is to have the HTTP and HTTPS versions of your site listed in Google Search Console with the crawl rate set to maximum and watch the stats carefully. If one set of stats goes up while the other goes down, then Google is understanding that you're transitioning from HTTP to HTTPS.
Another thing to check for is speed via webpagetest.org. with HTTPS, there's an SSL negotiation step that must happen before the first byte is sent to the user's browser. This step increases the TTFB (time to first byte). If you see that the time is too high (roughly over 200ms) then that will explain the drop in indexed pages. Google likes to index fast websites.
If you want to switch back to HTTP, then make sure none of the pages involve exchanging sensitive user data.
Solution 2
We just switched from HTTP to HTTPS two weeks ago, and after doing extensive research this is what we did:
- Added the HTTPS property to our Search console.
- Redirected
HTTP robots.txt
toHTTPS robots.txt
. - Placed a new
HTTPS sitemap
in therobots.txt
, and removed theHTTP sitemap
URL fromrobots.txt
. - Made sure that the old
HTTP sitemap
was intact, and made sure it was still existing in ourHTTP property
in the search console. - Submitted the new
HTTPS sitemap
in theHTTPS property
in the search console. - Made sure the
HTTPS sitemap
was the only sitemap being updated with new URLs. (Stopped adding new URLs to theHTTP sitemap
after the redirects.) - Changed all canonical URLs to
HTTPS
. - Made sure all
301 redirects
were in order and a one to one mapping was intact for allHTTP -> HTTPS
.
Currently we will keep the old sitemap for one month from the time of the switch.
We can already see a decline in the number of clicks on the HTTP property
, and a proportional increase in the number of clicks in the HTTPS property
.
Here's what you should see:
Our Search traffic declining on the HTTP property.
Our Search traffic increasing on the HTTPS property.
Solution 3
Are you checking the correct version of the search console? See the Google support site point 4: you need to add the https version as a new site. If you are still looking at the http version it's quite logical that the number of indexed pages is dropping as Google is indexing the https versions instead (which should be visible in the search console of the https version)
Solution 4
This is completely normal. HTTPS is technically a completely separate site, though traditionally, it mirrors the HTTP site. However, search engines cannot count on that. Switching to HTTPS has a cost associated with it. This means that your site has to be completely re-indexed. Part of the reason is that the search index is ordered around URLs as a key. You are, in effect, using a whole new set of URLs.
Your best bet is just to be patient and let it ride.
Solution 5
Apart from all suggestions given already, you might want to check if your document is loading content over HTTP instead of HTTPS (also known as mixed content).
See also prevent mixing content
fundamentals/security/prevent-mixed-content/fixing-mixed-content
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olimits7
Updated on September 18, 2022Comments
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olimits7 over 1 year
I did a full redesign of my website to make it responsive (bootstrap), added localization, and also switched the whole website to use HTTPS.
My website use to default to
http://www.domain.com/
and now it defaults tohttps://www.domain.com/en/
.It's been 3 weeks since I made this switch and I have noticed a 80%+ drop in my "indexed pages" under my Google Search Console. Also, I made sure to apply the following when I made this switch.
- Made sure to use 301 redirects
- The re-designed site uses all proper and tags
- XML sitemap is properly generated using tags and re-submitted to Google
- I setup all the appropriate Properties in Google Analytics & Webmaster Tools for my new default loading URL
Is this 80%+ drop in "indexed pages" normal?
Should I be waiting longer to see if my website recovers?
Or should I revert back to "HTTP" again?
Thank you!
-
closetnoc about 8 yearsA very good point adding HTTPS site - I forgot about that step!
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MrWhite about 8 yearsWhat do you see for the "number of indexed pages" in Google Search Console? Would you say the total (HTTP + HTTPS) has remained about the same? (Which your search traffic graphs would seem to suggest.)
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CP3O about 8 yearsYes it's definitely not gone down. It's about the same.