How to Remove a URL From Google Index?
Google the biggest and most used search engine in the world, when anyone needs any kind of information the first thing that comes to the mind is Google! And this is normal these days even students if they get stuck at something they prefer using Google rather than talking with their teacher. And it’s because they can get that answer right from their smartphone or computer.
Google is not only used by people to collect knowledge about something but even to make money (Blogging) and also by the companies to advertise about their company. Now I don’t know exactly that you are a blogger or a company if you wish to tell me you can do that by leaving your comment below.
When we start a website or a blog the first thing we do is register a domain name and host it on a server and make it appear on Google. And to make it appear on Google we have to add it to Google search console, I am sure you have done that.
In this article of mine, I will tell you the procedure which you need to follow to remove a URL from Google index, it is quite easy to remove a URL or URLs from Google’s index but before we start let me tell you the things which should be ready with you.
I can’t term it as things but you should have that website or web property added to Google search console and verified the ownership.
Please note with this guide you can only remove the URLs from Google’s Index only if you have access to search console account to which that domain or website is linked and verified.
Step to Remove a URL from Google Index using Remove URLs Tool
So now let me get started and tell you the procedure which should be followed to remove a URL from Google’s Index.
Open Google search console and sign in into your Google account with which you have verified the ownership of the website.
Select the website (property) from search console to whose URL you want to remove from the index of search engine giant. After that, you have click on Google Index and then on Remove URLs, you can refer the image embedded below for more clarity.
Now you will be taken to the Remove URLs tool of the Google search console and this is the feature of search console which we will be using.
There you will find the option which is termed as Temporarily hide now you may have a question in your mind why temporary? I have mentioned the answer below.
Why temporarily hide?
With the help of this tool we can’t remove any URL or page of your website permanently, we can do that temporarily and that’s the reason why they have mentioned the term temporarily there.
Umm…. but wait what if you want to remove the URL permanently from the Index? Read below to know it.
How to permanently remove URL from Google’s Index?
If you want to remove the URL permanently from the index you can do that but you have to follow the steps which are mentioned in this guide and also take some actions on your website too. You have to remove (delete) the page from your website or block Google from indexing the page by making the page noindex.
Now the choose is your, you can delete the page or URL from your website or make it as noidex. If you wish to read more about noindex you can follow this link and read it on Wikipedia.
So now let’s move on and see how to use Remove URLs tool.
Click on Temporarily hide button which you and enter the URL of your website which you want to remove from the Index.
And remember you have to enter or paste the URL don’t include your domain name.
What I mean is now assume I want to remove bloggingchamps.com/some-post/ then I have to enter some-post/ only and not the whole URL with the domain name. After that click on Continue button.
Now you will get three options and they are:
- Temporarily hide page from search results and remove from cache.
- Remove page from cache only.
- And temporarily hide directory.
Select whichever you want and click Submit Request.
And you are done, you have successfully requested Google to remove your URL from their Index, you will see the status as “Pending” for few hours and after that, your URL will be wiped off from the search results.
But remember you have to remove the source page or make it noindex to remove your URL permanently from the index
Further Reading Suggestions.
We can do lot more things using Google Search Console, I have covered some of the topics on my website which are linked below.
- How to set a Geographic target for your website?
- How to submit a reconsideration to Google?
- How to check backlinks of your website?
- How to check internal links of your website?
- And How to submit sitemap of your website?
I hope you are clear with all the steps which are mentioned in this guide, if you have any kind of doubts then you can leave your comment below. And don’t forget to subscribe to my website for more guides like this, I will deliver them to your inbox directly.