Indexability flags
also called Indexable statusIndexation reason
Definition
Whether the crawler judged a URL indexable, and the reason when it did not, the noindex directive, the canonical state and the HTTP status it was served.
Scope, grain and dimensions
- Grain
- One set of flags per crawled URL.
- Dimensions
- url
- Aggregation
- Per-URL attributes, not aggregates. The diagnosis tool filters to URLs judged not indexable and returns the reason fields beside each one.
- Metric type
- raw measure · flag values and reason labels per URL
Data sources
Where you'll see this
Named reports that normally include this metric.
AI bot activity reportCrawl log reportInternal linking reportTechnical SEO audit report
Skills and analyses that use it
Skills carry the judgment; the analysis verbs do the reading.
Analysis verbs
indexation_gap_diagnosisorphan_pages
Method rungs and levers
This sits on the bottom rung: if it reads badly, every measurement above it is unreliable.
levers L1 Technical & crawl health
Ask Quattr
- "What pages are blocked from indexing?" Simulate this →
- "Why is this page not indexed?" Simulate this →
How to read it
The reason column that turns an indexation problem into a task. Read the indexable judgment and the reason together, a page can be non-indexable by directive, by canonical, or by status, and each has a different owner and a different fix.
Caveats, freshness and failure modes
These are passthroughs of crawler-produced columns. The crawler's rules for deciding indexability are not readable in the semantic layer, so the flag is reported as the crawl's judgment rather than as a derived formula.
The judgment is what the crawl found; it is not confirmation of what the search engine did. Crawl reachability and actual indexing are different claims.
The list is capped, so it is the top non-indexable URLs rather than every one.
A crawl is a snapshot on its own schedule and can disagree with a page changed since.
- Freshness
- per crawl schedule, cadence is set per site; the card names the crawl it read.
Common failure modes
- Reading a non-indexable flag as proof a page is absent from the index.
- Reporting the capped list as the complete set of blocked pages.
- Acting on a stale crawl for a page that was fixed after it ran.
Not the same as
The confusions that cause the most wrong decisions.
Indexability flags Status-code hits Compare definitions →
Indexability flags are the crawl's assessment of a page; status-code hits are what your server actually returned to a real crawler. Assessment and observation, from different sources.
Watch this metric read in a real run
All runs →
2 min 8 secYou cannot be cited by an AI that never read your page.Server logs + AI visibility · AI crawler readiness◐Recreated from an anonymized session
2 min 15 secSome of your best pages cannot be reached from your own site.Site crawl + Search Console · Linking opportunity review◐Recreated from an anonymized session
Related metrics and workflows
Verification
A definition is the smallest part of this.
The measurement matters because something acts on it. Here is the rest of the showcase, in the order most people find useful.