How to Check Backlinks in Google Search Console
Short answer
To check backlinks in Google Search Console, open the Links report. Its External links section lists your top linked pages, top linking sites and top linking text. The data is a sample, not a complete list.
In this article
To check backlinks in Google Search Console, open the Links report, which lists links from other sites and internal links that Google has found. The Links report is free and uses Google's own data.
Agencies usually open the Links report when a client asks about new backlinks or about the sites linking to a competitor. This guide on how to check backlinks covers what the report shows, how Google counts links, how to export them and where the data stops.
Where is the backlinks report in Search Console?
The backlinks report is the Links item near the bottom of the Search Console left menu. Restricted user access is enough to open it.
The Links report has 2 columns: External links and Internal links. Every table in the Links report has a More button that opens its full list. Giving an agency access is covered in the guide to Search Console access.
What is in the Links report?
The Links report has 4 tables: top linked pages, top linking sites, top linking text and top internally linked pages. Each table lets you drill down.
| Table | What it shows | The question it answers |
|---|---|---|
| Top linked pages | Your pages with the most backlinks | Which pages do other sites cite most? |
| Top linking sites | The domains that link to your site most often | Which sites give you backlinks? |
| Top linking text | The text most often used in links to your site | Which words do other sites use when they link? |
| Top internally linked pages | Pages most often linked from your other pages | Which pages are strongest in the internal structure? |
Click a page to see the sites that link to that page. Click a site to see which of its pages link to you.
How does Google count backlinks in the Links report?
Google groups links by the canonical URL of the target page and by the root domain of the linking site. So m.example.com and example.com/pet_store/ both show as example.com.
Identical links from the same source URL to the same target URL are combined into one. Links without text, such as image links, show as (empty) in the link text table. The target URL column can differ from the original link when the target redirects or Google chose another canonical URL.
The Links report doesn't flag nofollow
The Links report doesn't show whether a link is marked nofollow. Open the source page to check the link's attributes.
How do you export backlink data?
Export backlink data with the Export external links button on the main page of the Links report. An export from the main page holds up to 100,000 rows.
The main page of the Links report offers 2 exports:
- Latest links holds the most recently found links, sorted by discovery date.
- More sample links holds an extra sample of links.
An export from a single table holds up to 1,000 rows. Values shown as ~ or - in the report are exported as 0.
How do you report backlinks to a client?
Report backlinks as a list of new linking sites this month, with the pages they link to. A monthly export of Latest links makes the comparison easier, because it is sorted by discovery date.
The backlinks part of a monthly report can hold these 3 things:
- The number of linking sites, compared with last month's export.
- New linking sites, with the target page on the client's site.
- Key pages without backlinks, as input for next month's plan.
State in the report that the backlink numbers come from Google's sample, so the client doesn't compare them directly with a third-party tool. Backlinks usually go in the off-page part of the monthly SEO report. Recalytics builds the off-page part of the monthly report from the backlink data the team uploads, together with the client's Search Console and GA4 data.
Frequently asked questions
Why does Search Console show a different backlink count from other tools?
Search Console shows a sample of the links Google found. Third-party tools use their own crawler and their own way of counting.
How often is the Links report updated?
Google's documentation doesn't give a schedule for the Links report. Check the last update date at the top of the report.
Do disavowed backlinks still show?
The Links report documentation doesn't say. The Links report only points to the disavow tool for spammy linking sites.
Sources
The Recalytics Team writes guides on SEO and analytics reporting for digital agencies and website owners, based on Google's official documentation and Search Console and GA4 data.