How to Make Your Website Crawlable and Indexable by Gemini
There is no separate Gemini crawler to court. Gemini's answers, in the Gemini app and in Google's AI Overviews and AI Mode, draw on the Google Search index that Googlebot builds. So making your site crawlable and indexable by Gemini mostly means making it crawlable and indexable by Google. Four settings are specific to Gemini and Google's AI features: the Google-Extended token in robots.txt, the Search generative AI setting in Search Console, snippet controls such as nosnippet, and firewall rules that may block Google's agent fetchers. Get the basics right first, then check those four.
Which Google crawlers and controls affect Gemini?
| Crawler or control | What it does | What to check |
|---|---|---|
| Googlebot | Crawls and renders pages for the Search index that Gemini draws on | Allowed in robots.txt; not blocked by your firewall |
| Google-Extended | A robots.txt token, not a crawler. Controls use of your content for Gemini training and for grounding in the Gemini app | Not disallowed, if you want Gemini app answers to use your pages |
| Search generative AI setting | Search Console setting that includes or excludes your site from AI Overviews, AI Mode and generative features in Discover | Left on “include” |
| nosnippet, max-snippet, data-nosnippet | Limit what Google may show from a page, including in AI features | Not applied to pages you want quoted |
| Google-Agent | Fetcher for agents on Google's infrastructure acting on a user's request; generally ignores robots.txt | Not blocked by bot protection, if you want agents to complete tasks |
| Google-GeminiNotebook | Fetches URLs users add as sources in Gemini Notebook (formerly Google-NotebookLM) | Pages reachable without login |
How each Gemini product uses Search is covered in whether Gemini uses Google Search data.
What is the step-by-step checklist?
- Allow Googlebot in robots.txt on every page you want in AI answers. Check for leftover staging rules, such as a site-wide Disallow, and do not block the CSS and JavaScript Google needs to render pages.
- Decide on Google-Extended. It is allowed unless a rule blocks it. If no group names Google-Extended, it follows the
User-agent: *group, so a file that allows Googlebot by name but disallows everyone else blocks Google-Extended too. Look for rules added by plugins or your CDN; Cloudflare's managed robots.txt, for example, disallows Google-Extended along with other AI training crawlers. - Make pages indexable. Each should return a 200 status, carry no noindex tag, and have a canonical tag pointing to itself or to the version you want shown.
- Put the main content in the HTML. Googlebot renders JavaScript, but rendering can be delayed, and most other assistants, including ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity, read only the raw HTML when they fetch a page. Server-side or static rendering covers both, as explained in how to make JavaScript pages readable to AI crawlers.
- Submit an XML sitemap with accurate lastmod dates. Google uses lastmod only when it is consistently accurate.
- Check snippet controls. A nosnippet tag keeps a page out of AI features. Use data-nosnippet only on sections you really want hidden.
- Leave the Search generative AI setting on include. Excluding a site removes it from links and grounding in AI Overviews, AI Mode and Discover's AI features.
- Let verified Google traffic through your firewall. Bot protection that challenges Googlebot makes your pages much less likely to be cited in Google's AI answers, and challenging Google-Agent stops agents completing tasks on your site.
How do you test whether Google can crawl and index a page?
- URL Inspection in Search Console shows whether a page is indexed, which canonical Google chose, and a live test with the rendered HTML. Check that your main text appears in it.
- The Page indexing report lists pages Google found but did not index, with the reason: noindex, redirect, duplicate or crawled but not indexed.
- The Generative AI performance report in Search Console shows impressions in AI Overviews and AI Mode by page. Pages that never appear there may have a crawling or indexing problem, or simply not match what people ask.
- Search for an exact sentence from the page in Google, in quotation marks. If nothing comes back, the page is probably not indexed.
- Ask the Gemini app a question the page answers, and ask it to search the web. Check the sources it lists.
- Read your server logs for Googlebot and Google-Agent requests, and confirm they are real by checking IP addresses against Google's published lists, as covered in how to verify crawlers and detect spoofed bots.
Gemini's citations are also visible without Search Console, as covered in which pages Gemini cites.
Which indexing problems stop pages being used?
Some problems do not block crawling but still keep the right page out of answers:
- Duplicates and faceted URLs. Filtered category pages with parameters can be indexed instead of the main category. How to spot this is covered in how to check whether Gemini cites thin faceted URLs.
- Conflicting canonicals, where the tag, sitemap and internal links point at different versions.
- Soft 404s: empty or “no results” pages returning 200.
- Thin pages that Google crawls but chooses not to index.
- Content behind logins or interactions, such as tabs that load text only after a click.
Do location signals help Gemini understand where you operate?
Gemini answers depend on the user's location and language, so be explicit about yours. Use hreflang for language or regional versions, state your address and service area in text on the page, and add Organization or LocalBusiness markup with the same details. For local businesses, the Google Business Profile carries more weight than any on-page code. None of these override where a page is indexed; they help Google match it to the right questions.
Should you prepare for more bot traffic?
AI features have added crawlers and user-triggered fetchers, and some sites see more automated traffic. Preparing is sensible:
- Cache pages at a CDN, so bot requests do not reach your application server.
- Do not rate-limit Googlebot harshly. If you must slow it urgently, Google's documentation says to return a 500, 503 or 429 status for a short period, a couple of hours or a day or two. Doing it for longer can harm how your site appears in Google.
- Watch crawl stats in Search Console for server errors and slow responses.
- Block abusive scrapers by verified identity, not by blanket rules that also catch Google.
We have not run crawl tests on Gemini ourselves. This page is based on Google's crawler, indexing and Search Console documentation.
What might this look like in practice?
Consider an illustrative Brisbane accountancy firm that never appeared in Gemini answers. URL Inspection showed its service pages indexed, but the live test's rendered HTML held only a loading spinner: the text arrived through a script Google had not run. The robots.txt also carried a Google-Extended block added by a security plugin. The developer switched the pages to server rendering, and the owner removed the block after deciding Gemini app answers mattered more than keeping content out of training. Within six weeks the Generative AI performance report showed the service pages appearing in Google's AI features for local tax questions.
What do people ask about Gemini crawling?
Is there a Gemini crawler?
No. Gemini draws on Google's Search index, which Googlebot builds. Google-Extended is a robots.txt token, not a crawler.
Does blocking Google-Extended remove me from AI Overviews?
No. Google-Extended does not affect Search, including AI Overviews and AI Mode. It affects Gemini training and grounding in the Gemini app.
Can I submit my site to Gemini directly?
No. Submit a sitemap in Search Console and request indexing for important pages; Gemini uses the same index.
How long until changes show up in Gemini?
Once Google recrawls and reindexes a page, usually days to weeks. The Gemini app may still answer from memory until it searches.
Published by The Kovmere Team · updated Sep 29, 2026 · More resources