What is website crawling?

Website crawling is the process by which search bots (crawlers) go through a site's pages to discover what is on them.

---

#How it works:

1. A bot enters the site via a link For example, Googlebot starts from the homepage or an external link.
2. It reads the HTML code It extracts text, headings, links, images, meta tags.
3. It finds new links The bot follows them and scans further - this is exactly what "crawling" a site means (crawl).
4. It saves the data Everything found is passed on for indexing - to be shown in search later.

---

#What affects crawling:

• robots.txt - can block access to specific sections.
• Server speed - if the site is slow, the bot will visit less often.
• Internal linking - the better the link structure, the deeper the bot goes.
• Crawl budget - the limit on the number of pages the bot is willing to review on a site.

---

#Important:

Crawling ≠ indexing. A bot can crawl a page but not include it in the index (for example, because of noindex, a duplicate, or empty content).

---

Conclusion: Crawling is like reconnaissance: the bot studies the site to decide what is worth saving and showing to users.