The Technical SEO Checklist: 40 Fixes That Actually Move Rankings

Content wins rankings. Technical SEO makes it possible for content to win rankings. Skip the technical layer and even the best content gets buried — because Google either can't crawl it, can't index it, or thinks it's slow, unsafe, or duplicate.

This is the practical technical SEO checklist we run through on every audit. Forty specific items, ordered by impact, with the actual fix for each. Print it, work through it, come back in a month for measurable wins.

1. Crawlability

• robots.txt exists at the domain root and doesn't accidentally block important pages.
• Important pages are linked from other internal pages (no orphans).
• Navigation and footer expose your primary URLs.
• Pagination uses regular <a> links (not JS-only clicks).
• Facet/filter URLs aren't creating infinite crawl loops.

2. Indexability

• XML sitemap exists at /sitemap.xml, submitted to Google Search Console.
• Sitemap includes every important page, excludes low-value ones.
• No accidental noindex on important pages.
• No nofollow on your own internal links.
• Every important page returns HTTP 200 (not 3xx/4xx/5xx).

3. Site speed / Core Web Vitals

• LCP ≤ 2.5s at 75th percentile (Chrome UX Report).
• INP ≤ 200ms.
• CLS ≤ 0.1.
• TTFB ≤ 200ms on your primary market's geography.
• Images in modern formats (AVIF/WebP), responsive sizes, lazy-loaded below fold.
• No render-blocking JS or CSS in the head.
• Web fonts preloaded, font-display: swap.

See our Core Web Vitals explained piece for the deeper dive.

4. Mobile

• Responsive design, no horizontal scroll on mobile.
• Tap targets ≥ 48×48px with adequate spacing.
• Text readable without zooming (min 16px body).
• No intrusive interstitials that cover main content.
• Same content on mobile and desktop (Google indexes mobile first).

5. HTTPS + security

• HTTPS active on every URL, no mixed content warnings.
• HTTP redirects to HTTPS via 301.
• HSTS header set.
• SSL certificate auto-renews (Let's Encrypt or hosted).
• No accidental exposure of .git, .env, or admin URLs.

6. Structured data

• Organisation schema on the homepage.
• BreadcrumbList schema on every page below the top level.
• Article schema on blog posts.
• Product schema on product pages.
• FAQPage schema where FAQs exist.
• Review/Rating schema where genuine reviews exist.
• Validated with Google's Rich Results Test tool.

7. Canonical tags

• Every page has a self-referencing <link rel="canonical">.
• Duplicate pages canonical to the primary version.
• No canonical pointing to a 404, 301, or noindexed page.
• URL parameter variants canonicalise correctly.

8. URL structure

• Short, readable URLs — no dates, no query strings unless necessary.
• Hyphens between words, all lowercase.
• No trailing slash inconsistencies (pick one, stick with it, redirect the other).
• Primary keyword in the URL where natural.

9. Internal linking

• Every important page has at least 3 internal links pointing to it.
• Anchor text is descriptive (not click here).
• Related content is cross-linked at the bottom of articles.
• Site has a logical hierarchy — top pages, category pages, individual pages.

See internal linking strategy for the depth.

10. International / hreflang (if applicable)

• hreflang tags declare language + region for every locale.
• Each locale has a self-referencing hreflang.
• Return tags are bidirectional (locale A points to locale B, vice versa).
• Sitemap includes hreflang annotations where possible.

The full 40-point audit at a glance

The bottom line

Technical SEO isn't glamorous. It's plumbing. But every point on this list — done or ignored — either supports or sabotages your content's ability to rank. Print this checklist, work down it once a quarter, and technical SEO stops being the thing holding you back.