Search Console Insights: The Simple Report and What It Shows

Google's Insights report documentation describes it as "a simplified overview of key metrics and traffic changes across your site". It sits inside Search Console, next to the Performance report, and is built for people who want the headlines without filtering tables. This guide covers what each part of the report shows, what changed in 2025 and 2026, and when to switch to the full Performance report.

What Search Console Insights is now

Search Console Insights started as a separate tool. Google's June 2021 announcement introduced it as an experience that "joins data from both Search Console and Google Analytics", opened from the Overview page or a direct link, and at the time it only supported Universal Analytics properties.

That standalone version is gone. On 30 June 2025 the Search Central blog announced the new Search Console Insights report, "integrated directly into the main Search Console interface, replacing the current standalone beta experience". It was rolled out gradually, and the help page still says it "may not be available to everyone".

The new report is described as being "based on performance metrics from Google's Web Search results". Unlike the 2021 version, the current help page does not mention Google Analytics data. For what visitors do after they land (engagement, conversions), you still need Google Analytics 4.

If you are new to Search Console itself (adding a property, verification, sitemaps), start with our Google Search Console basics guide. This page assumes your property is already set up.

The cards in the report

You open the report from the Search Console menu (direct link) and pick the time range with the date selector at the top. Google lists these cards:

• Clicks and impressions: how often your site was clicked and how many times it appeared in Search results in the selected period, with the trend against the previous period.
• Your content: your pages, split into top, trending up and trending down.
• Queries leading to your site: the search terms that brought clicks, also split into top, trending up and trending down.
• Top countries: where the people who clicked your site were located.
• Branded and non-branded traffic: clicks from people who searched for your brand versus general searches (more below).
• Additional traffic sources: clicks from outside Google's Web Search results, such as Image search, Video search, News search and Discover.
• Social channel insights (experimental): Search performance of social channels Google has linked to your site.

Each list starts short. "View more" expands it to up to 20 items, and clicking any item opens the Performance report filtered to that page, query or country for the same time range.

Insights also keeps the "Achievements" feature from the old tool. Google sends an email when you pass a milestone, such as a new threshold for total clicks from Google Search in the last 28 days.

How "trending up" and "trending down" work

For pages and queries, "trending up" means more clicks than in the previous period and "trending down" means fewer. Google's help page adds one detail that matters when you read the lists: the order "is based on an increase or decrease in the number of clicks, not the percentage change".

So a page that went from 400 to 300 clicks ranks above one that went from 20 to 5, even though the second lost a bigger share. For a small site, that is usually the right order to work in: the biggest absolute losses cost the most visits. Check the smaller drops too, though, because a new page losing most of its clicks can be an early sign of a problem.

Google's 2025 announcement suggests using trending-down pages as candidates for "a refresh or further investigation" and trending-up queries as "a great source for new content ideas".

Query groups

Many searches mean the same thing but are written differently. In October 2025 Google added query groups to the "Queries leading to your site" card, using the example of "guacamole dip recipe", "guac dip recipe" and "how to make guacamole dip" all reflecting one intent.

• A group is named after its best-performing query.
• The clicks shown are the total for every query in the group, not just the top one.
• The card shows a few example queries; click the group to see all of them in the Performance report.
• The groups are computed with AI, "may evolve and change over time", and do not affect ranking.

Groups only appear for properties with a large volume of queries. A site with fewer queries keeps seeing a simple list, as the help page notes.

Branded and non-branded traffic

Google announced the branded queries filter on 20 November 2025, with an update on 11 March 2026 that it is "now available to all eligible sites". It adds a filter to the Performance report and a card in Insights showing total clicks from branded versus non-branded searches.

A branded query includes your brand name, misspellings of it, or a product or service unique to you (Google's example is Gmail for google.com). The classification is done by an AI-assisted system, not by a keyword list you control, and Google warns it "may mislabel branded and non-branded queries". It has no effect on ranking.

Two limits mean many sites will not see it:

• It only works on top-level properties, not URL-path properties like example.com/blog/ or subdomain properties.
• The site needs enough queries and impressions.

Why it is useful: branded searches come from people who already know you, while non-branded clicks show whether your content reaches new people. If total clicks are flat but non-branded clicks are falling, your SEO is weakening even if brand demand is hiding it. If you do not have the filter, the "Filter by query" option in the Performance report still lets you include or exclude your brand name yourself; a regex filter can catch all its spellings at once.

Social channels and platform properties

In December 2025 Google started an experiment that added Search data for some social channels to the Insights report, but only channels Search Console had identified itself, and only for a limited set of sites. The Insights help page still lists this as an experimental card where you "can't choose your own channels".

In July 2026 that turned into a separate property type. Google's platform properties page explains that you can add an Instagram, TikTok, X or YouTube account as its own Search Console property, verify it by authorizing the connection, and get Performance, Insights and Achievements reports for it. A 29 July 2026 post said platform properties were then "globally available to everyone".

Two points from the help page are worth knowing before you add one: data takes a few days to appear, and the reports show only how your content performs on Google, not views inside the platform itself.

Insights versus the Performance report

Both use the same Search data, and Google says the group totals in Insights should match the clicks in the Performance report. The difference is depth. The Performance report gives you:

• Four metrics: clicks, impressions, CTR and average position. Insights focuses on clicks and impressions.
• Six dimensions: queries, pages, countries, devices, search appearance and dates.
• A search type filter for web, image, video and news, with web split into text-based and multimodal searches (such as Google Lens).
• A 24-hour view with hourly data points, which includes preliminary data that may still change.
• Comparisons between periods, regex filters, sharing a view and exporting data.

Use Insights to see what changed, and the Performance report to find out why. A typical path: Insights shows a page trending down, you click it, and in the Performance report you compare the two periods by query to see which searches lost clicks, then check whether impressions or position fell. If the page dropped out of search entirely, the page indexing report tells you whether Google still indexes it.

A simple monthly routine

For a business site, ten minutes a month in Insights is a reasonable habit:

1. Set the range to the last 28 days and check total clicks and impressions against the previous period.
2. Look at the top three trending-down pages. Open each in the Performance report and decide: refresh the page, fix a technical issue, or accept a seasonal dip.
3. Read the trending-up queries. A question people already find you for, but that no page answers well, is a strong idea for new content.
4. If you have the branded card, note the branded and non-branded split so you can see the trend over months.
5. Check "Additional traffic sources" if images, video or Discover matter to you.

Write down what you changed and when. Google's Search Console annotations let you mark the date on the Performance chart, so later changes in traffic are easier to explain.

Frequently asked questions

Is Search Console Insights free?

Yes. It is a report inside Google Search Console, which is free to use for any site you have verified.

Where did the old search.google.com/search-console/insights page go?

Google replaced the standalone beta with the Insights report inside Search Console, announced on 30 June 2025. You now open it from the Search Console menu.

Do I need Google Analytics for Search Console Insights?

No. The 2021 version used Google Analytics data, but the current report is based on Google Search data. Use Google Analytics 4 for what visitors do on your site.

Why don't I see query groups or the branded card?

Query groups only appear for properties with a large volume of queries. The branded split needs a top-level property and enough queries and impressions. Small sites see a plain query list instead.

Why is a page with a small percentage drop listed above a bigger percentage drop?

Trending lists are ordered by the change in the number of clicks, not the percentage change, so larger absolute losses come first.

Can I add my YouTube or Instagram account?

Yes, as a platform property. Instagram, TikTok, X and YouTube are supported. Each account is its own property, and data takes a few days to appear.

Want someone to watch your Search Console data and act on it every month? See our services or email [email protected].