On-Page SEO Checklist: 25 Checks for Every Page (2026)

This is the on-page SEO checklist I use on client pages before and after publishing. It is grouped into five parts so you can work through it in about 30 minutes per page. For the full picture of what on-page work includes, see my on-page SEO service page.

1. Search intent and keyword (checks 1 to 5)

1. One main topic per page. Pick one primary keyword and its close variations. Do not target the same keyword on two pages.
2. Match the intent. Search the keyword and look at the top 10. Are they guides, product pages, lists or tools? Your page should be the same type.
3. Cover the subtopics. List the questions the top pages and “People also ask” answer, and cover the important ones.
4. Answer first. Put a clear 40 to 60 word answer near the top. It helps readers, featured snippets and AI Overviews.
5. Add something new. First-hand experience, your own examples, data or a tool. Google’s helpful content guidance rewards original value.

2. Content quality (checks 6 to 10)

6. Clear author and date. Show who wrote the page and when it was updated.
7. Short paragraphs and plain words. Most readers skim, especially on mobile.
8. Use tables, steps and examples where they make the answer faster to understand.
9. Cover related terms naturally. Write about the topic fully instead of repeating one keyword. This is the heart of semantic SEO.
10. Cite sources for facts and numbers, and link to them.

3. Title, meta and headings (checks 11 to 16)

11. Unique title tag with the main keyword near the start and the brand at the end. See how to write SEO title tags and test the length with the title pixel width checker.
12. Meta description that summarises the page and gives a reason to click. Guide: meta description guide.
13. One H1 that matches the topic of the title.
14. Logical H2 and H3s that read like a table of contents. Check with the heading structure checker.
15. Short, readable URL with the main words, for example /on-page-seo-checklist/. Use the slug generator.
16. Canonical tag pointing to the page itself (or to the main version of duplicate pages).

4. Links and media (checks 17 to 21)

17. 3 to 5 internal links to related pages, with descriptive anchors. See my internal linking strategy.
18. Links to this page from at least 2 or 3 related older pages, so it is never an orphan.
19. Useful outbound links to trusted sources.
20. Optimised images: descriptive file names, WebP or AVIF, width and height set, lazy loading below the fold.
21. Alt text that describes the image. Examples: alt text examples.

5. Schema and page experience (checks 22 to 25)

22. Schema markup that matches the page: Article, Product, LocalBusiness, FAQPage and so on. Read the schema markup guide.
23. Core Web Vitals in the “good” range: LCP 2.5s or less, INP 200ms or less, CLS 0.1 or less. Guide: Core Web Vitals.
24. Mobile friendly layout, readable font size, tap targets that are easy to press.
25. Indexable: no accidental noindex, not blocked in robots.txt, included in the XML sitemap.

The checklist as a quick table

Frequently asked questions