Enter your site. In a few seconds the SEO doctor reads it the way Google does and tells you what is stopping Google from reading it, what to fix, and what is fine.
Can Google load it?
The home page answers, and it does not send Google away with a noindex tag or header.
Is Google allowed in?
robots.txt does not disallow the whole site, and the canonical tag names your own address.
Is there anything to read?
The content is in the HTML your server sends, not only on the screen after JavaScript runs.
Why is my website traffic dropping? The six usual causes
A drop has a small number of causes, and they leave different marks in your data. Two of the six are fixed on the site. The other four are not your site at all, and knowing that saves weeks of changing things that were never broken. For the long version, with how to tell them apart step by step, read why your website traffic is dropping.
1. Something on the site is keeping Google out
Fixed on your site
What it looks like. Pages leave the index soon after a launch or a redesign. The usual culprits are a noindex tag, a robots.txt that disallows everything, or a canonical that names another site.
A noindex directive appears on 3.5% of desktop sites, and 13.3% have no robots.txt at all. (HTTP Archive, 15 January 2026)
Pages built in the browser with JavaScript are not shut out: in one study Google rendered every page it fetched, half of them within 10 seconds and one in ten only after about three hours or more. (Vercel and MERJ, 31 July 2024)
The doctor. The doctor checks this now. It takes about ten seconds and needs no login.
2. A redesign or a move changed your URLs
Fixed on your site
What it looks like. One section disappears on a single date. The old addresses return an error instead of redirecting, and Google stops showing the site for the searches those pages answered.
Moving a site to a new domain is slow to recover from: only 27% of moves were back to their old traffic within 90 days, the median took 304 days, and 13.9% had not recovered after three years. (SALT.agency, 26 June 2026)
When URLs change, Google asks for the redirects to stay in place for at least a year. (Google Search Central, updated 20 August 2026)
The doctor. The case study below is this cause. Finding it needs your Search Console data, which is the doctor’s next step.
3. A Google ranking update
Not your site
What it looks like. A step down on the dates of a rollout, across most pages at once, with average position getting worse.
Google confirmed three core updates and one spam update in 2025. In 2026, up to 10 November, it confirmed three core updates and four spam updates, the latest core update starting that day. (Google, read 10 November 2026)
After the March 2026 core update, an analysis of German domains found 134 that lost visibility and 32 that gained: four losers for every winner. (SISTRIX, 9 April 2026)
Google says recovering from a core update can take several months, and sometimes waits for the next core update. (Google Search Central, updated 10 December 2025)
The doctor. Needs your Search Console data: the date of your drop is matched against Google’s own list of updates.
4. AI answers are taking the click
Not your site
What it looks like. You are shown as often as before, at the same positions, and fewer people click through.
When an AI Overview appears, the click-through rate of the top-ranking page is 58% lower. That is a correlation across keywords, not proof of cause. (Ahrefs, 4 February 2026)
People click a search result about half as often when the page shows an AI summary: 8% of visits against 15%. (Pew Research Center, 22 July 2025)
About two in three Google searches in the U.S. now end without a click: 68.01% in the first four months of 2026, up from 60.45% in 2024. (SparkToro, June 2026)
Google disputes the decline: it says total clicks from Search to websites were about the same as a year before. (Google, 6 August 2025)
The doctor. Needs your Search Console data: clicks falling while impressions and position hold.
5. Search Console changed how it counts
Not your site
What it looks like. Impressions fall and average position improves, and clicks do not move. Nothing was lost.
In September 2025 Google stopped serving 100 results on one page. Of about 320 Search Console properties checked afterwards, 87.7% showed fewer impressions. (Search Engine Roundtable, 22 September 2025)
Google says Search Console reported impressions wrongly from 13 May 2025 until 27 April 2026. Clicks were not affected. (Google Search Console Help, 2026)
The doctor. Needs your Search Console data: the dates are checked against known reporting changes.
6. Fewer people are searching for it
Not your site
What it looks like. Your positions hold and impressions fall. The same weeks fell last year too.
Google lists changing demand among the main causes of a traffic drop. (Google Search Central, updated 10 December 2025)
The doctor. Needs your Search Console data: this year is compared with the same dates last year.
The figures describe the web as a whole or samples of sites. They say how common a cause is, not which one is yours. Your own data says that.
Case study: 96% of impressions gone, and it was not the Google update
A small software company’s site, built with Next.js, with a blog of how-to articles. In the spring of 2026 its impressions in Google fell from about 925 a day to about 35, and stayed there. The numbers are real; the name is withheld.
Month
Impressions a day
Clicks a day
Average position
March 2026
851
1.1
55.0
April 2026
361
0.7
54.5
May 2026
44
0.7
36.8
June 2026
33
0.4
12.6
July 2026
38
0.4
14.1
August 2026
34
0.9
20.3
September 2026
25
0.9
9.9
October 2026
42
1.1
11.9
What it looked like
Two steps down: 52% on 28 March 2026 and 75% on 19 April 2026. The March 2026 core update began rolling out on 27 March, one day before the first step. An owner looking at that chart blames the update, waits for the next one, and nothing comes back.
What the data said
Clicks did not move: 1.0 a day before, 1.1 after. A 96% fall in impressions cost no visitors.
Average position got better, from 55.5 to 13.0. That happens when what disappeared was ranked low: the pages that are left rank higher on average.
All of the loss was in one section, the blog. The home page and the product pages were shown more than before, not less. A demotion of the whole site would have shown there too.
The lost searches were gone completely, not ranked lower. Pages that slip keep some impressions. These kept none.
What it was
One request settled it. The old blog addresses returned “404 not found”. A rebuild had moved the blog to new URLs and left the old articles behind with no redirects. Google did what it was told: it dropped pages that no longer existed.
What to take from it
Look at clicks before impressions. Impressions count every time a page is shown at any position, and the way they are counted shifted twice between 2025 and 2026 (cause 5 above).
A date that matches an update is a coincidence until the rest fits. A core update usually shows across the site, with positions getting worse. This was one section, and positions improved.
After a rebuild, request your old URLs. Each one should redirect to its new address, and Google asks for those redirects to stay for at least a year (Google Search Central).
What this check can and cannot tell you
It can tell you whether something on the site itself keeps Google out. Those problems are binary and usually quick to fix: one tag, one line in robots.txt, one setting left on from before launch.
It cannot tell you why traffic fell on a site Google reads fine. That answer is in your search data: which pages and searches lost traffic, on what date, and whether a Google update was rolling out. For links from other sites, use the backlink checker. All the free SEO tools are on one page.
Questions
What does the SEO doctor check?
It reads your home page, robots.txt, your sitemap and a few more pages, the way a search engine does. It looks for the things that stop Google from reading a site: a home page that does not load, a noindex tag, a robots.txt that blocks everything, and a canonical tag that names another site. It also flags pages that are empty until JavaScript runs, and smaller problems such as a missing sitemap or missing page titles.
Why is my website traffic dropping?
Six causes account for most drops. Two are on your site: something is keeping Google out (a noindex tag, a robots.txt rule, a wrong canonical), or a redesign changed your URLs without redirects. Four are not your site: a Google ranking update, AI answers taking the click, a change in how Search Console counts, and fewer people searching. The SEO doctor checks the first cause from your site address alone. Telling the others apart needs your Search Console data.
Why is my website not showing up on Google?
The common causes are a noindex tag left on from before launch, a robots.txt that disallows the whole site, a canonical tag that points to a site builder’s preview address, or a site so new that Google has not indexed it yet. The doctor checks the first three. If none apply, Google can read your site, and Search Console will show which pages it has indexed.
Why did my Google ranking drop?
Usually for one of three reasons. A Google update re-ranked the results: Google confirmed three core updates in 2025 and three more in 2026 by November. Someone else published a page that answers the search better. Or your own page changed, moved or stopped loading. If many pages fell on the same day, look for an update on that date. If one page fell, look at that page and at who now ranks above it.
Why is my SEO not working?
Usually one of three things. Google cannot read the site, which the doctor checks. The pages target searches that nobody makes, or searches where much stronger sites already hold the first page. Or it has not been long enough to tell. Start with the check, because nothing else you do counts until Google can read the site.
Why did my Google Search Console impressions drop?
Look at clicks first. If clicks held, it is probably the counting and nothing was lost. In September 2025 Google stopped serving 100 results on one page, which changed how impressions are counted: in one set of about 320 sites, 87.7% showed fewer impressions afterwards. Google has also said a logging error misreported impressions from 13 May 2025 to 27 April 2026, with clicks unaffected. If clicks fell too, the drop is real.
Can AI Overviews cause my website traffic to drop?
Yes, and without your rankings changing. Ahrefs found the click-through rate of the top result is 58% lower when an AI Overview appears, and Pew Research found people clicked a result in 8% of visits with an AI summary against 15% without one. Google disputes that total clicks to websites have fallen. In your own data it shows as steady impressions and positions with fewer clicks.
How long does it take to recover from a traffic drop?
It depends on the cause. A noindex tag or a robots.txt block is lifted once Google crawls the pages again. After a ranking update, Google says it can take several months, and sometimes the next core update. After a move to a new domain, one study of 1,052 migrations found a median of 304 days.
Do I need an account, and what do you store?
No account. The doctor fetches public pages only, the same ones any visitor or search engine can load. The result is kept for 24 hours so a repeat check is instant, then dropped.
Sources
Every figure on this page was read on its source page on 10 November 2026. Each entry gives what was measured, so you can judge how far it applies to you.
HTTP Archive, Web Almanac 2025: SEO, 15 January 2026. HTTP Archive crawl of the web. These are shares of all sites, not of sites that lost traffic.
Vercel and MERJ, How Google handles JavaScript throughout the indexing process, 31 July 2024. Over 100,000 Googlebot fetches on three well-built sites, April 2024. It shows Google can render JavaScript, not that every such site is indexed well.
SALT.agency, Only 27% of domain migrations recover in 90 days, 26 June 2026. 1,052 domain migrations. Recovered means monthly organic traffic back at the old domain’s six-month average. Domain changes only, not redesigns on the same domain.
Google Search Central, Site Moves and Migrations, updated 20 August 2026. Google’s own guidance for site moves.
Google, Search Status Dashboard: ranking history, read 10 November 2026. Counted from the ranking incidents on Google’s Search Status Dashboard, read on 10 November 2026.
Google Search Central, Google Search’s Core Updates, updated 10 December 2025. Google’s own guidance for site owners.
Ahrefs, Update: AI Overviews Reduce Clicks by 58%, 4 February 2026. 300,000 keywords, half with an AI Overview and half without, December 2023 against December 2025. Desktop, correlational.
Search Engine Roundtable, Impact Of Google Blocking Bots On Search Console Data, 22 September 2025. One analyst’s set of about 320 properties, reported by Search Engine Roundtable. The original post was not read.