Search
Your pages rank about as well on phones as on desktops
seo.gsc-device-divergence
Why this matters
Google decides how to rank a page from the mobile version of it, so a page that consistently sits lower in phone results than in desktop results is being judged on something a desktop visit does not show you. The usual causes are content that is hidden or cut short on a small screen, a page that is markedly slower on a phone connection, or interstitials that only appear on mobile. Most site owners check their work on a desktop, which is exactly why this goes unnoticed.
Who fixes it
A developer
Roughly how long
an hour per page
Care needed
Low risk to change
How to fix it
Open one of these pages on an actual phone rather than a narrowed browser window, and compare what you can see against the desktop version. Three things account for most of it. Content that is collapsed, tabbed away or truncated on small screens still counts, but content that is not in the mobile HTML at all does not — check that the phone version really contains the same text. Speed is judged on a phone connection rather than yours, so a page that feels instant on a laptop can be slow where it is measured. And anything that covers the page on arrival — a cookie wall, a newsletter prompt, an app banner — is treated more harshly on mobile than on desktop. Search Console's URL Inspection will show you the mobile HTML Google actually holds, which is the fastest way to see a difference you did not know was there.
How we score it
Failing this check takes up to 15 points off your search score. This one is a measurement rather than a fact about your markup, so two scans of an unchanged site can legitimately differ a little.
Does your site pass this one?
This check runs on every scan, along with the other 121. Free, no account, and you see the evidence for each result.
Check my siteOther search checks
- Canonical tags point somewhere validA canonical tag tells Google which address is the real one for a page. When it points somewhere wrong — another domain, a dead page, or the wrong protocol — Google follows it anyway, and the page you wanted indexed can be dropped in favour of one that does not exist.
- Content has been updated recentlySome content is meant to sit still, and age alone is not a fault. But prices, opening hours and staff pages that have not been touched in over a year are usually wrong by now — and a visitor who acts on the wrong opening hours does not come back to check whether the rest was right.
- Descriptions are a sensible lengthLong descriptions get truncated mid-sentence; very short ones waste the space you are given.
- Each page has exactly one title tagA page can only have one title. When there are several, the browser and Google each pick one — and they do not always pick the same one, so what you see in the tab may not be what appears in search.
- Each page has one main headingSeveral top-level headings makes the structure of the page ambiguous. Worth checking rather than urgent — modern HTML permits it, and Google handles it, but it usually signals that headings are being chosen for their size.
- Each search you rank for is served by one page rather than severalWhen several of your pages answer the same search, the things that decide ranking — links, engagement, relevance — are divided between them instead of accumulating on one. Google picks whichever it currently thinks is best and can change its mind week to week, and the result is that a search you should own is served by two or three pages, none of which does well. It is invisible from inside the site: every page looks fine on its own.