IndexaHow search engines find, crawl and index your pages
Getting a page indexed is three separate steps that people usually collapse into one: discovery (the engine learns the URL exists), crawling (it fetches the page), and indexing (it decides the page is worth storing and serving). Submission tools — sitemaps, IndexNow, the Google Indexing API — only accelerate the first step. These guides explain what each step actually depends on, and are honest about which parts you can control.
Every guide below is written against primary sources: Google and Microsoft documentation, the IndexNow specification, and the concrete behaviour of the HTTP endpoints involved. Where something is unverified or unofficial, it says so.
Submitting a URL is not a guarantee that it will be indexed — that decision always rests with each search engine. What a submission tool controls is the notification half: making sure every engine knows about every page the day it is published or changed.
Why isn't Google indexing my pages?
The actual reasons pages stay unindexed, what "Discovered — currently not indexed" means, how it differs from "Crawled", and what URL submission cannot fix.
Read the guide →Google Indexing API: what it actually covers
An honest guide to the Google Indexing API: the two page types it officially supports, the real 200-per-day quota, and what a 200 response does not mean.
Read the guide →What is IndexNow and which engines use it?
IndexNow explained properly: the request format, how the key file proves ownership, which engines participate (Google does not), and what each code means.
Read the guide →How do I get a new site indexed faster?
A realistic first-week playbook for a brand new site: what to set up on day one, why new domains index slowly, and what actually accelerates it.
Read the guide →Sitemaps vs IndexNow vs manual submission: which should I use?
How sitemaps, IndexNow, Search Console Request Indexing and the Google Indexing API differ in effort and quota, and why they complement rather than replace.
Read the guide →Frequently asked questions
What is the fastest way to get a page indexed by Google?
There is no reliable instant path. The fastest realistic combination is: the page is in a sitemap with an accurate lastmod, it is linked from a page Google already crawls often, and the URL is submitted through Search Console or the Indexing API. Discovery can then take minutes; the decision to index still takes anywhere from hours to never, and depends on the page being worth indexing.
Does submitting a URL force Google to index it?
No. Submission is a notification, not an instruction. Google states that it does not guarantee indexing for URLs submitted through any channel, including Search Console’s Request Indexing button. Any tool claiming guaranteed indexing is overclaiming.
Do I still need a sitemap if I use IndexNow?
Yes. IndexNow is a push notification for participating engines (Bing, Yandex, Seznam, Naver, Yep) and Google is not one of them. A sitemap remains the baseline discovery mechanism for Google, and it is the canonical list an engine can re-check at any time. See sitemaps vs IndexNow vs manual submission.
Stop hand-submitting URLs
Indexa reads your sitemaps every day and submits what changed — to Google’s Indexing API with your own Google Cloud project, and to Bing, Yandex, Seznam, Naver and Yep over IndexNow. It runs on your own computer; your credentials never leave it.
Submitting a URL is not a guarantee that it will be indexed — that decision always rests with each search engine. What a submission tool controls is the notification half: making sure every engine knows about every page the day it is published or changed.