Google search engine indexes ?m=1 page instead of canonical page

Question

So i have my site, and it is working fine, except for one thing, google indexing, I just uploaded some posts and it seems likes google doesn't like links that does not end with a ?m=1. Let me explain, so i've been facing this issue for a while now, and google seems to prioritize mobile indexing first, to my surprise, my website isn't even for mobile, but they still do.

However, When requesting index for httpx://www-example-c-om/2024/07/whatever.html the GSE returns page redirect error, BUT ,httpx://www.example.com/2024/07/whatever.html?m=1 Somehow, someway, it gets index in LITERALLY 1 minute, with the canonical being the httpx://www.example.com/2024/07/whatever.html , like, i'm not ranting or anything, I am just speechless.

My whole sitemap.xml content doesn't end with ?m=1, so you're telling me that i (me), myself, have to index each post one by one, or better off, i should somehow , someway, again, try and make it that way, just to comply with google goofy rules, how am i supposed to fix a problem that is theirs?

Update: I got this respose from google: Thanks for contacting the Google Search Central support team.

I understand that you have issues with page with redirect for your page https://www.ex.com/2020/10/forest.html.

When you use the URL Inspection tool, you might get errors from when Google last crawled and processed your page. Since this isn't live data, do a live test to know the status of how Google checks your page. I've checked your website and sample URL.

• Currently https://www.ex.c-om/2020/10/forest.html is marked as page with redirect in a favor of https://ex-blogspot-com/2020/10/forest.html as Google-selected canonical, however, in the Live test the page can be indexed with the correct canonical set by you.

• The Google-selected canonical (https://ex.blogspot.c-om/2020/10/forest.html) is returning the 404. Everything seems to be working as intended at this moment, however the report may take time to reflect in the Search Console.

To help Google Search Console keep up, here are a few suggestions:

To clear the cache for this page, use the Removals tool. Make sure to update your sitemap. Optimize your website so you're under crawl budget. It isn't guaranteed that a page can be indexed even if it meets all requirements.

Regarding the redirect to ?m=1, Googlebot mostly crawls as a mobile user, it also sees the redirects. Some platforms will have this set up automatically. Since your website is hosted in Blogger, you can refer to this Community Guide for more information. If you have any additional questions regarding the Blogger platform, you can check our Blogger Help Community.

If you need further assistance, let me know.

Thanks! Shelly

Answer 1

Blogger use adaptive design rather than reponsive design. That means, if you reach it via a mobile user agent, you will be redirected to a ?m=1 version of the same page, which has been built specifically for mobile.

Blogger's pages all have the canonical tags set without the ?m=1 parameter, so when they are indexed, they will not be indexed with that parameter.

This means that when Google use a mobile bot, it will see a redirect page. However, the pages found by their mobile crawler will still be indexed correctly because of the canonical tag being in place.

Their desktop bot will crawl everything as you'd expect but, as you say, they don't tend to prioritise that bot.

You should not need to keep re-indexing pages, as once Google know your site exists, they should re-crawl it and find new pages automatically. Likewise, they'll keep checking your sitemap to see if it has changed. The crawlers will follow the redirects.

The bigger problem is perhaps your use of Blogger. Their approach seems really old fashioned, and the site commonly just used for spam. If SEO is important to you, I'd perhaps suggest it's time to move to a more modern solution.

(Blogger's last update was in 2020, which may suggest why you started seeing this around then. However, the lack of subsequent updates suggests Blogger is not a major concern of Google's. )