Is site: a reliable method for getting full list of indexed pages?

[bjalc2011]

The site:domain.com search seems to show less pages than it used to (Google and Bing).

It doesn't relate to a specific site but all sites. For example, I will get "page 1 of about 3,000 results" but by the time I've paged through the results it will end and change to "page 24 of 201 results". In that example If I look in GSC it shows 1,932 indexed.

Should I now accept the "pages" listed in site: is an unreliable metric?

[GlobeRunner]

Typically, the site: command in Google is unreliable. There are lots of reasons why, one being that there may be pages indexed that aren't "good enough", for whatever reason, to show up in the search results. When we look at the site pages indexed, we typically will use the site: command, then click a few pages deep and look at the number it shows (not the first number of pages it shows).

For SEO auditing purposes, we're looking to see if there is a significant difference between the number of pages indexed and the number of pages that we find when we we crawl the website ourselves.

[RobertFisher]

I am not sure I understand where you say, " ...it will end and change to "page 24 of 201 results." I have used the site: operator a long time and I think it is reasonably accurate. One thing I notice is the occasional "some pages have been ... duplicate" and do you want to see those? So, if you include all of those what's the magic number?

Is there a reason you want the data that demands an exact result? I am not sure of anything that would give you that. The question is "indexed" within the given search engine. If you crawl with screaming frog, etc. you may see pages that are not indexed, so the comparison is not apples to apples. Just curious as to what you are wanting to know exact indexed pages for?

Interesting question.

[bjalc2011]

Hi Robert,

Thanks for your input.

The reason for doing it is part of an SEO site review process to examine pages indexed in Google compared to a site crawl in a tool like screaming frog and the indexed pages defined in GSC.

In terms of the "page 24 of 201 results" example, I mean that when you first use the site:domain.com Google will give you an estimated number of results, e.g. 3000 but actually as you click through the pages you find that the number of results is reduced - sometimes significantly.

[RobertFisher]

I just haven't seen where the pages reduced, but I only use that operator for a general search. I have never gone through all the pages, etc. For that I would use any of the crawler tools. It would be interesting to see a download of search, GSC, and then something like Screaming Frog to see what we see.

As soon as I wrote that I checked our site and realized what you are saying. For Google we get "About 281 results," as I go to last page of results it changes to "page 13 of 126 results."

Then out of curiosity I tried Bing and now I am scratching my head: "763 results." When I go to last possible page I get, "247-256 of 256 results." I think that means my 281 results from Google are mostly on Bing!!!! (in case someone does not realize my humor, that last statement can be defined as either jest or sarcasm.)

So, when doing the site: I get 126 with Google but search console has 428...

Certainly interesting. I will keep playing with it.

Best

[GlobeRunner]

Keep in mind that for a site:domain.com search, Google now includes pages from OTHER SITES that are using the canonical tag to point to your site. So, even though it says there are 300 pages indexed, 30 of those pages might be on other sites that use the canonical tag pointing to your site. The numbers of pages indexed that you're looking at may not be entirely accurate because of this.