Technical SEO
February 21, 2026 12 min

Technical SEO Checklist

Technical SEO Checklist

What is Technical SEO?

Technical SEO is the sum of all infrastructure work done to ensure your website is properly crawled, understood, and indexed by search engines.

No matter how good the content is, if there are technical problems, Google cannot see, rank, or may misunderstand that content. Technical SEO is the foundation upon which all other SEO work is built.

In this guide, you will find 30 critical items of technical SEO, why each one matters, and how to check them.

Why is Technical SEO So Important?

Most sites operate without knowing they are full of technical issues. Slow page load times, uncrawlable pages, mobile incompatibilities, broken links — each of these directly affects how Google evaluates your site.

As of 2026, Google is applying user experience as a ranking factor much more strongly. Technical SEO issues are no longer just a matter of "it's nice to be clean"; they are real variables that make a difference in rankings.

Crawling and Indexing

1. Register with Google Search Console GSC is essential for seeing how your site is perceived by Google. Coverage reports, crawl errors, manual actions, and performance data are all gathered here. If it's not set up yet, set it up today.

2. Create and Submit an XML Sitemap An XML sitemap gives Google a list of all the pages on your site. Create one and submit it to Google via GSC. It is especially critical for large sites and blogs that regularly publish new content.

3. Check Your Robots.txt File Robots.txt determines which sections of your site search engines can access. A misconfigured robots.txt file can prevent critical pages from being crawled. Check it at yoursite.com/robots.txt.

4. Identify Crawl Budget Issues The resources Google allocates to crawl your site are limited. Unnecessary URL parameters, infinite pagination, and duplicate content waste this budget. Track it through the "Crawl Stats" report in GSC.

5. Find Orphan Pages Pages that cannot be reached by any internal link are called "orphan pages." Google has difficulty finding these pages. Use site crawling tools to identify them and add internal links.

Index Control

6. Review Noindex Tags Pages carrying the <meta name="robots" content="noindex"> tag are not indexed by Google. Noindex tags accidentally added to important pages cause serious visibility losses. Check via GSC's coverage report.

7. Validate Canonical Tags When the same content exists at multiple URLs, you need to indicate which page is the "primary page" using a canonical tag. Incorrect canonicals cause authority splitting of your content.

8. Check Pagination Structure For content spanning multiple pages (blog lists, product categories), the pagination structure should ensure Google correctly associates the content.

9. Check Hreflang Tags (For Multilingual Sites) Hreflang tags are critical for sites that offer content in multiple languages. They tell Google which page is for which language and country. Incorrect hreflang leads to the wrong content being shown to the wrong users.

Site Speed and Performance

10. Measure Your Core Web Vitals Scores Google's three core page experience metrics: LCP (loading speed), INP (interaction responsiveness), CLS (visual stability). Check all your pages via PageSpeed Insights or the "Core Web Vitals" report in GSC.

LCP target: under 2.5 seconds. INP target: under 200ms. CLS target: under 0.1.

11. Optimize Images Unoptimized images are the most common cause of slowdowns. Use WebP format, match image dimensions to their actual display size on the page, and apply lazy loading.

12. Configure Browser Cache Configuring browser cache for static files (CSS, JS, images) significantly reduces page load time on repeat visits.

13. Use a CDN A Content Delivery Network (CDN) stores your files on distributed servers around the world. It serves content from the server closest to the user and significantly reduces load times, especially for international traffic.

14. Minify CSS and JavaScript Files File sizes are reduced by removing unnecessary spaces, comment lines, and excess characters. This process is called "minification" and reduces page weight.

15. Reduce Render-Blocking Resources Some CSS and JS files cause the browser to wait for them to finish before displaying the page. Loading these files asynchronously or deferring them improves initial rendering speed.

Mobile Compatibility

16. Test Mobile Compatibility Google uses mobile-first indexing — meaning your site's mobile version, not the desktop version, is evaluated. Check every page with Google's Mobile-Friendly Test tool.

17. Adjust Touch Targets On mobile devices, buttons and links should be large enough to be easily tapped with a finger. Clickable elements that are too small or placed too closely together negatively affect both user experience and CLS score.

18. Check Viewport Settings The <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"> tag ensures the page is correctly sized on mobile devices. If missing, the page will not display properly on mobile.

HTTPS and Security

19. Verify Your SSL Certificate HTTPS is one of Google's official ranking factors. Regularly check your certificate's validity and expiration date. An expired SSL makes your site appear insecure and negatively affects rankings.

20. Check HTTP to HTTPS Redirects Your HTTP version should be forwarded to HTTPS with a 301 redirect. Verify that both versions (with and without www) are correctly redirected.

URL Structure

21. Clean Up Your URL Structure A good URL is short, meaningful, and contains keywords. Unnecessary parameters, numbers, or meaningless characters make the URL unreadable for both users and Google.

Bad: mysite.com/p=123&cat=45 Good: mysite.com/technical-seo-guide

22. Identify and Fix Broken Links (404) 404 pages both harm user experience and waste Google's crawl budget. Regularly check with Screaming Frog or GSC; if there are broken links, either bring the content back or add a 301 redirect.

23. Break Redirect Chains Multiple redirect chains in the form of A → B → C cause losses in both speed and link authority. Chains should always be resolved in a single step (A → C).

💡 DexterGPT automatically detects a large portion of the technical issues on this list and provides one-click fix suggestions — without leaving the dashboard.

Structured Data (Schema Markup)

24. Implement Core Schema Types Structured data explains to Google exactly what your content means. Schema types such as Article, FAQ, Product, Local Business, and Recipe earn rich snippets in search results and increase click-through rates.

25. Check for Schema Errors Verify that your structured data is error-free using Google's Rich Results Test tool. Incorrect schema prevents rich snippet display.

Duplicate Content

26. Identify Duplicate Content Having the same or very similar content at multiple URLs causes Google to be unable to decide which page to rank and leads to authority splitting. Resolve with canonical tags or 301 redirects.

27. Consolidate WWW and Non-WWW Versions www.mysite.com and mysite.com can be perceived as two different sites. Redirect one to the other with a 301 and specify your preferred version in GSC.

Internal Linking Structure

28. Strengthen Your Internal Link Architecture Internal links both distribute page authority across the site and help Google understand the relationships between your content. Every newly published piece of content should receive internal links from related existing pages.

29. Keep Anchor Texts Natural Using keywords in link text (anchor text) tells Google what the link is about. However, providing all internal links with the same keyword can signal over-optimization. Maintain variety.

Technical SEO Monitoring

30. Audit Technical SEO Regularly Technical SEO is not a one-time effort. As new content is published, site structure changes, and Google's algorithm updates, new issues may arise. Conduct a comprehensive technical audit at least every three months.

Prioritizing Technical SEO Issues

A list of thirty items may seem overwhelming at first glance. Not knowing where to start often results in never starting at all.

A simple framework for prioritization: Start with the highest-impact and easiest-to-resolve issues first.

High impact, quick fix: SSL check, robots.txt error, XML sitemap submission, noindex errors, 404 pages.

High impact, more work: Core Web Vitals improvements, image optimization, schema implementation, internal link architecture.

Medium impact, periodic check: Redirect chains, duplicate content, canonical issues, crawl budget optimization.

Technical SEO and Content SEO Work Together

Technical SEO does not replace content SEO; it makes it possible. The content of a site with a solid technical foundation is correctly read, indexed, and evaluated by Google.

Conversely, no matter how strong the content is, a site with technical problems remains constantly behind a barrier.

Strengthening both areas together is where SEO work truly delivers results.

💡 DexterGPT automatically performs technical SEO audits while also identifying your content gaps, producing articles, and publishing across all platforms. One panel, end-to-end SEO.

Conclusion

Technical SEO may seem intimidating; but when approached item by item, each is an understandable and solvable problem.

Go through this list by crawling your site. Every issue is an opportunity that directly affects your rankings. As you resolve issues, you will see that Google understands your site better and your content work starts producing results faster.

Technical SEO is not a field to be set up once and forgotten — but once it sits on a solid foundation, everything you build on top of it stands much stronger.

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