Google cached https rather than http

[TheDude]

Google is using a secure version of a page (https) that is meant to be displayed using only http.  I don't know of any links to the page using https, but want to verify that.  I only have 1 secure page on the site and it does not link to the page in question.

What is the easiest way to nail down why Google is using the https version?

[RyanKent]

Google adds pages based on following links. If your site offers a link to the page, or even if any other site offers a link, then it can be crawled and potentially indexed.

If you do not wish the page to be listed you have a few options. You can canonicalize the page to point to the non-secure version. For example let's assume you have the page http://www.mysite.com/info.html. Let us also assume you have a secure version of the page. On both pages I would recommend adding the following code:

That code tells Google the http:// version of the page is the preferred version, and the other page is a duplication.

If you do not have a duplicate page issue and you simply don't wish a page to be listed in SERP, then add the "noindex" tag to the page.

What is the easiest way to nail down why Google is using the https version?

Google will list any pages it finds. That's their role. Unless you specifically provide a reason for them not to index a page, such as the canonical tag, a noindex tag, or block them with robots.txt, they will list a page. They have no way of knowing you wanted the http:// version listed unless you tell them.

To fix the issue, you can add the canonical and the next time they check the page they will update their data. It may take a bit of time depending on the size of your site.

[TheDude]

Great answer!  I'm a bit behind on using canonical tags, but that makes perect sense.  Thanks so much!