Free Mobile-Friendly Checker
Most of your visitors are on a phone, and Google ranks the mobile version of your site. If your page breaks, hides content or crawls on mobile, it quietly disappears for those visitors. Test any page as a phone, with Google's mobile speed test included.
Free · No sign-up · Nothing stored
Google retired its Mobile-Friendly Test. This checker fills the gap
In December 2023 Google retired its Mobile-Friendly Test and the Mobile Usability report, and now points people to Lighthouse and PageSpeed Insights. Those measure speed well but don't tell you, in plain words, whether phones get the same page as desktops. This mobile friendly test does both: it compares the phone and desktop versions of your page, checks the settings that make a page usable on a small screen, and runs Google's mobile speed test.
What the mobile-friendly checker tests
| Check | Pass when | If it fails |
|---|---|---|
| Loads on phones | The page answers a mobile browser with HTTP 200 | Fix errors or blocks that only affect phones |
| Viewport | width=device-width is set | Add the viewport meta tag |
| Zoom | Visitors can pinch to zoom | Remove user-scalable=no and low maximum-scale |
| Same content | Phones get the same content as desktop | Show the full content on mobile |
| Layout shift | Images declare width and height | Add width and height attributes |
| Blocking scripts | No scripts in the head hold up the first paint | Add defer or async, or move them down |
| Speed | Google's mobile score plus LCP, INP and CLS | Lighten images and scripts |
Mobile-first indexing, in plain words
Google looks at your site mostly through a phone. If your desktop page has three paragraphs and a table but the phone version shows one paragraph, Google indexes the one paragraph. Hidden menus are fine, as long as their content is in the page; content that phones never receive simply doesn't count.
The three numbers behind the speed score
Google measures page experience with three numbers. The checker shows them when Google has real-visitor data for your page:
| Metric | Good | Poor | What it measures |
|---|---|---|---|
| LCP: Largest Contentful Paint | 2.5 s or less | Over 4 s | How fast the main content appears |
| INP: Interaction to Next Paint | 200 ms or less | Over 500 ms | How quickly the page reacts to taps |
| CLS: Cumulative Layout Shift | 0.1 or less | Over 0.25 | How much the layout jumps while loading |
The overall speed score is a lab test: one simulated load on a mid-range phone and slow network. It's useful for spotting problems, but the real-visitor numbers above are what Google uses.
Real result: our homepage
We ran the page checks on cmoowls.com: it loads on phones with HTTP 200, the viewport is set to the device width, phones get the same content as desktop, and every image declares its size, so the layout doesn't jump. Those four passes are the baseline every page should hit before you worry about the speed score.
Fixing a page, in priority order
- Add the viewport tag if it's missing: <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1">. Nothing else matters until this is right.
- Show phones the full content. If the mobile version leaves things out, they don't exist for Google.
- Allow zoom. Remove user-scalable=no and low maximum-scale values.
- Give images a width and height to stop layout shift.
- Shrink heavy images. The Image Size Checker lists them, heaviest first.
- Defer scripts that block the page from showing.
Where this mobile test stops
- It tests one page. Templates repeat, so fixing one page often fixes many, but check your main page types. Watch Owl checks every page, and Owl-gorithm Hacker audits rendering across the site.
- The speed test is capped on busy days to protect a shared Google quota; the page checks still run.
- It doesn't see logged-in pages or content behind cookie walls and pop-ups.
Mobile-friendly pages on one map
A page that works on phones still needs to be indexable: check it with the Indexability Checker, and make sure its title fits small screens with the Meta Tag Checker.
Keep every page working on phones
Watch Owl crawls your whole site for errors, broken layouts and accessibility issues, and checks Core Web Vitals page by page.
Frequently asked questions
Is the mobile-friendly checker free?
Yes. It's free with no sign-up and nothing stored. The speed part uses Google's PageSpeed Insights, so on very busy days we may skip it and still run every other check.
Does Google still have a Mobile-Friendly Test?
No. Google retired its Mobile-Friendly Test tool and the Mobile Usability report in Search Console in December 2023, and points site owners to Lighthouse and PageSpeed Insights instead. This checker combines a phone-versus-desktop comparison with a PageSpeed Insights mobile test.
Why does mobile matter for Google?
Google uses mobile-first indexing: it mainly crawls and ranks the version of your pages that phones get. Content that's missing or broken on phones is, for Google, missing.
Which real-visitor speed numbers does the checker show?
Google's three measures of real page experience: LCP, how fast the main content appears (good is 2.5 seconds or less); INP, how fast the page responds to taps (200 ms or less); and CLS, how much the layout jumps (0.1 or less).
What's the difference between the speed score and real-visitor data?
The speed score is a lab test: one simulated load on a mid-range phone over a slow connection. Real-visitor data comes from actual Chrome users over the last 28 days and only exists for pages with enough traffic. When both are shown, the real-visitor numbers are the ones Google uses.
Why is disabling zoom a problem?
user-scalable=no or a low maximum-scale stops people zooming in to read, which fails accessibility guidelines (WCAG 1.4.4) and frustrates visitors with smaller screens or weaker eyesight.
How do I fix layout shift?
Give every image and video a width and height, or an aspect ratio in CSS, reserve space for ads and embeds, and don't insert banners above content after the page has loaded.
Is a responsive design enough?
It's the foundation, but not the whole job. A responsive page can still hide content on phones, load huge images or block the screen with a pop-up. That's why the checker compares what phones and desktops actually receive.
Does this test on a real phone?
It loads your page the way an iPhone browser asks for it and runs Google's mobile test, which simulates a mid-range phone. It's a strong signal, but checking the page on your own phone is still worth a minute.
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