Free Vibe Code SEO Checklist

Ensure that search engines can access and interpret your content correctly, even with heavy JavaScript.

• Test rendering in GSC (URL Inspection) — Ensure Googlebot can see core text and links in the rendered HTML.
• Check 'View Page Source' vs. 'Rendered HTML' — Confirm that essential content isn't hidden behind JavaScript.
• Validate client-side routing — Make sure pushState/replaceState URLs resolve to crawlable HTML.
• Detect hydration errors — Catch React/Vite hydration mismatches that break content visibility.
• Monitor JavaScript errors — Prevent rendering failures that could stop pages from being indexed.
• Implement prerendering or SSR — Ensure search engines reliably access full page content without heavy JS execution.

Help crawlers discover, navigate, and properly prioritize your website's pages.

• Canonicalization check — Confirm every page has the correct self-referencing canonical.
• Domain consistency (301s) — Redirect platform/staging domains to the production domain.
• XML sitemap validation — Ensure sitemap is valid, updated, and only contains indexable URLs.
• Robots.txt validation — Verify key pages aren't accidentally blocked.
• Crawl budget review (GSC Coverage) — Identify important pages that are crawled but not indexed.
• Navigation crawlability — Use standard <a href> links, not JS-only click events.
• Pagination crawlability — Confirm that paginated content uses crawlable URLs such as including a ?page=2 query parameter.
• Internal link depth — Keep key pages accessible within 3–4 clicks from homepage.
• Orphan page detection — Find and fix pages with no internal links pointing to them.
• Link equity flow analysis — Ensure high-value pages receive sufficient external and internal linking.

Optimize speed and responsiveness to improve both user experience and Google ranking signals.

• Largest Contentful Paint (LCP < 2.5s) — Optimize hero images and fonts for faster above-the-fold load.
• Interaction to Next Paint (INP < 200ms) — Minimize input delay by reducing heavy JavaScript.
• Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS < 0.1) — Set fixed sizes for images/ads to avoid content jumps.
• First Contentful Paint (FCP < 1.8s) — Improve perceived load speed by prioritizing critical CSS/JS.
• Time to Interactive (TTI < 3.8s) — Limit main-thread blocking for smoother interactivity.
• Server response time (TTFB) — Optimize hosting or caching so the server responds quickly.
• CDN configuration validation — Use a CDN to speed up asset delivery and reduce latency.
• Mixed content check — Prevent HTTPS sites from loading insecure HTTP resources.
• HTTP/2 verification — Ensure the site uses HTTP/2 for faster parallel loading.

Protect your site, improve user experience, and enhance visibility in search results.

• Accessibility audit (WCAG basics) — Improve usability and indirectly boost SEO signals by meeting accessibility standards.
• Security headers audit (CSP, X-Frame-Options) — Protect against attacks while signaling site quality to search engines.
• JSON-LD schema validation — Add complete, valid structured data to improve eligibility for rich results.
• Mobile-first indexing validation (GSC) — Confirm Google's mobile bot can crawl and render content correctly.
• Meta viewport validation — Ensure pages display correctly on all devices with a responsive viewport tag.