Search engines storing a page so it can appear in results. Crawled and indexed are not the same thing — a page can be read and then left out.
This is the step most new sites lose pages at, and it is invisible unless you look. Search Console reports pages as "Crawled — currently not indexed" or "Discovered — currently not indexed", both of which mean Google looked and decided not to bother.
The reasons are usually quality and priority rather than a technical fault. Thin pages, near-duplicate pages and pages nothing links to are the usual casualties. On a large site built from templates, whole sections can be dropped this way.
| Discovered — not indexed | Google knows the URL, has not visited | Usually crawl priority — link to it better |
|---|---|---|
| Crawled — not indexed | Google read it and passed | Usually quality or duplication |
| Duplicate, Google chose different canonical | Two pages look the same | Consolidate or differentiate |
| Excluded by noindex tag | You told it not to | Check that was deliberate |
This comes up most often in Technical SEO & Site Speed. Crawling, indexing, speed, structured data and site architecture — the plumbing that decides whether your pages can compete.
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