Site move, alternate site addressesHow to make HTTP and HTTPS versions of the site available
A narrow but consequential case: a visitor’s device cannot open the HTTPS version of a site — Yandex’s own example…
Site move, alternate site addresses
Site move, alternate site addressesSetup instructions for popular site platforms
Every address change in Yandex — new domain, adding or removing www, moving to HTTPS — comes down to the…
Site move, alternate site addressesUngrouping sites
Ungrouping is the reverse of the mirror procedure: separating addresses Yandex has grouped so they can rank independently again. It…
SitelinksSitelinks
Sitelinks are the additional links Yandex places under a result to help users reach a section directly. They are generated…
SitelinksViewing and editing sitelinks
The generated sitelinks for a site are listed under Display in the search → SERP links. Unlike Google, Yandex both…
View in search resultsSite region
Regionality in Yandex is an explicit site attribute, not something inferred from hosting or language. For location-dependent queries — Yandex’s…
Broken links
Broken links waste crawl budget, strand users, and leak the value of incoming links. Yandex Webmaster separates them into three…
Internal
The Internal links report lists broken links inside your own site — links Yandex followed and found leading nowhere. These…
Broken linksExternal
The External links report shows links pointing at your site from elsewhere that now lead to an error. Every one…
Clicks on broken links
Clicks on broken links shows the links that real users actually followed into an error, based on anonymised Yandex Browser…
Working with Yandex WebmasterTools
The console’s tools work on any site, though limits are lower without verified ownership. Each replaces an assumption with a…
Robots.txt analysis
The robots.txt analyser does three jobs: validate the file, test specific URLs against it, and keep a change history. The…
ToolsSitemap validator
The sitemap validator checks a file against Yandex’s requirements before you commit to it. It accepts input three ways: pasted…
ToolsServer response check
The server response check is the most-used diagnostic in the console, because it shows what the robot receives rather than…
ToolsXML validator
The XML validator checks a feed against its XSD schema — syntax, structure, content model and data types — for…
ToolsStructured data validator
The structured data validator checks the markup Yandex reads: Schema.org, microformats, Open Graph and HTML microdata. What it tells you…
ToolsIP address check
The IP address check tells you whether an IPv4 address belongs to Yandex. It is the quick counterpart to a…
ToolsChecking for a certificate
Yandex checks the SSL/TLS certificate on the site and reports problems, including chain and validity issues that browsers may tolerate…
ToolsTool usage limits
Yandex Webmaster tools work without adding a site, but with lower limits. Verified ownership raises the quotas. What changes with…
Tips for using Yandex Webmaster
A collection of interface conveniences: theme switching, table configuration, data export, and keyboard shortcuts inside Yandex Webmaster. The ones worth…
Working with Yandex WebmasterTerms and definitions
Yandex uses several terms differently from the way they are used in English-language SEO, and a few have no Google…
Site indexingHow does Yandex search work?
Yandex Search runs the same three stages as any modern engine — discovery, indexing, ranking — but the failure modes…
Site indexingHow can I add a site to search?
Pages appear in search after Yandex robots visit them. The question of how to get a site into search reduces…
What files can be included in search results?
Yandex indexes HTML plus a defined list of file formats, each up to 10 MB: PDF; Microsoft Office DOC, DOCX,…
Site indexingHow many site pages are included in search?
Counting how many of your pages are in Yandex is a two-source exercise: a site: query gives an approximation, the…
Site indexingHow do I check if a site is accessible to users and…
Availability is the precondition for everything else. Yandex makes the consequence explicit: if the robot cannot reach the site because…
Site indexingHow do I check if all important pages are included in search?
Aggregate indexing numbers hide the failure of individual pages that matter. Checking important pages explicitly is a separate discipline. How…
Site indexingHow do I inform Yandex about changes on the site?
Yandex’s recommendation for notifying it about new and updated pages is not to choose one method but to combine several:…
How to monitor and manage indexing?
Monitoring indexing means answering five questions, and the console has a report for each: when the robot came and what…
Site indexingHow do my site pages appear to indexing bots and users?
This page answers a question worth asking directly: how does a page look to an indexing bot, and what can…
Site indexingHow do I prevent from indexing the pages that aren’t needed in…
Most sites contain pages nobody should find in search: service and administration pages, content useful only to logged-in users such…
Site indexingWhy should I avoid duplicate pages?
Duplicate pages split signals and waste crawl budget, and on large catalogues they are generated automatically rather than written deliberately.…
Site indexingMoving the site
A site move in Yandex is a defined operation: group the old and new addresses, then designate the new one…
Robots.txtUsing robots.txt
robots.txt sets crawling parameters for search robots. Restricting sections reduces server load and speeds the site up. Yandex supports the…
Robots.txtThe User-agent directive
The robot looks for records beginning with User-agent: and matches either the substring Yandex (case-insensitively) or *. The precedence rules…
Disallow and Allow directives
Disallow prevents crawling of sections or pages; Allow permits them. Yandex lists what belongs behind Disallow: pages with confidential data,…
Robots.txtThe Sitemap directive
The Sitemap directive declares where the sitemap lives. Several may be listed, one per line: User-agent: Yandex Allow: / sitemap:…
The Crawl-delay directive
Crawl-delay has been ignored by Yandex since 22 February 2018. Any site still carrying the directive is carrying a line…
Robots.txtThe Clean-param directive
Clean-param is a Yandex extension with no equivalent elsewhere: it tells the robot which URL parameters do not change the…
Robots.txtHow to check that a robot belongs to Yandex
Robots can claim to be Yandex by setting the user agent. Verification is done by reverse DNS lookup, and the…
Robots.txtHow do I lower a load on the site or server?
The robot plans its own visits and adjusts load automatically. Requests can spike when it discovers a new section, a…
Meta tags
Meta tags tell the robot how to load, index and display a page. Yandex takes account of a specific set,…
About the IndexNow protocol
IndexNow lets a site notify Yandex directly about pages that were created, updated or deleted, instead of waiting for the…
IndexNowVerification key
The IndexNow key proves you control the site. You generate it, place a file containing it on the site, and…
IndexNow API request reference
The API is deliberately small: one endpoint, two methods. One URL — GET GET https://yandex.com/indexnow?url=<String>&key=<String>[&keyLocation=<String>] url and key are required;…
IndexNowCMS plug-ins
IndexNow can be automated with plugins written by third parties. Yandex lists them for popular systems and attaches a disclaimer…
Sitemap
Yandex supports XML and TXT sitemaps and reads them from robots.txt or from the console. Requirements worth remembering Fifty thousand…
How do I prohibit indexing of the site or pages?
Three instruments hide content from indexing, and they operate at different levels: the whole site or a section, an individual…
How do I remove pages from the search?
Removing a page from search is a two-step operation, and skipping the first makes the second fail. Prohibit indexing first,…
Site indexingSaved copy
The saved copy shows the version of a page Yandex last indexed, with the date. It is the fastest way…