Getting organic traffic by ranking on the first page of Google is every blogger’s dream, and to make that happen, you genuinely need to be targeting keywords people are actively searching for.

So how do you actually find out which keywords your blog is already ranking for? Let’s get into the details.

SEO With Google: A 100% Free Keyword Rank Checker

How to Check Your Keyword Ranking for Free

Once you’ve done your keyword research and optimized your content, the next step is analyzing your actual progress, seeing what’s working and what isn’t.

There are plenty of tools that can help with this analysis, but for this post, we’re focusing on Google Search Console. Here’s the great part: the free keyword rank checker you need is built right into it.

Google’s crawlers regularly scan websites and use what they find to decide when and where to show your pages in search results. If your website isn’t connected to Google Search Console, you genuinely can’t track how it’s actually performing in search.

Connecting your site to Search Console is essentially telling Google, “My website is ready to be indexed and I want visibility into how it’s doing.”

How to Set Up Google Search Console

If you haven’t connected your site yet, here’s how:

1. Go to Google Search Console and sign in with the Google account associated with your site.
2. Click “Add Property.”
3. You’ll be asked to choose between two property types: Domain or URL prefix. This choice matters, so it’s worth understanding the difference before picking one.

Domain vs. URL Prefix: Which Should You Choose?

• Domain property covers your entire site, including all subdomains and both http and https versions, in a single property. This is generally the recommended option since it gives you the fullest picture of your site’s performance in one place. The catch: Domain properties can only be verified through a DNS TXT record, meaning you’ll need to log into wherever you manage your domain’s DNS settings (your domain registrar or host) and add a verification record there.
• URL prefix property covers only the exact URL you enter, so if your site is accessible through multiple versions (with and without “www,” http and https), you’d technically need a separate property for each to get complete data. The upside is URL-prefix properties support several verification methods, including the HTML tag method described below, which doesn’t require touching your DNS settings.

For most bloggers, especially if you’re comfortable making a quick DNS change (or your host makes it easy), a Domain property is worth the slightly extra setup effort since it gives you complete, unified data.

If DNS access feels intimidating or your host makes it difficult, a URL-prefix property with HTML tag verification is a perfectly valid alternative, you’ll just want to make sure you’re using the primary version of your URL that most of your traffic actually reaches.

Verifying With the HTML Tag Method (URL-Prefix Property)

If you’ve chosen a URL-prefix property and want to verify using the HTML tag method:

1. After entering your URL, choose “HTML tag” from the available verification methods.
2. Copy the meta tag code Google provides.
3. Go to your website’s backend and paste the copied code right before the closing </head> tag, then save your changes.
4. Return to Search Console and click “Verify.”

Verifying With WordPress and Rank Math

If you’re on WordPress, this process can be simplified significantly.

Installing the free Rank Math SEO plugin can guide you through the setup and handle the Search Console connection for you, including generating and inserting the verification code automatically, so you don’t have to touch your theme’s code directly.

1. Install and activate Rank Math.
2. In the Rank Math dashboard, look for “Setup Wizard.”
3. Click it and follow the on-screen prompts, which will walk you through connecting your site to Google Search Console as part of the broader setup process.
4. Once connected, open Google Search Console and select your site.
5. In the left sidebar, click “Sitemaps.”
6. Click “Add New Sitemap.”
7. Enter “sitemap_index.xml” (this is Rank Math’s default sitemap filename) and click “Submit.”

How to Access the Free Keyword Rank Checker

Once your Search Console setup is complete, here’s how to find your keyword rankings:

1. From Search Console, select your website property.
2. In the left sidebar, click “Performance.”
3. You’ll see a chart displaying Total Clicks, Total Impressions, Average CTR, and Average Position. Make sure “Average Position” is toggled on, since it’s sometimes not enabled by default.

From this data, you can see every keyword phrase your website currently ranks for on Google, how many clicks and impressions each one has generated, and your average position for that term.

A Few Tips for Getting More Out of This Data

• Look for keywords ranking just outside page one, typically positions 11 through 20. These are often your best opportunities, since a modest content or SEO improvement can push them onto page one, where click-through rates jump significantly.
• Compare clicks against impressions. A keyword with high impressions but low clicks might mean your title or meta description isn’t compelling enough to earn the click, even though you’re showing up in search.
• Filter by specific pages using the “Pages” tab alongside “Queries” to see exactly which keywords are driving traffic to which posts. This helps you understand which content is genuinely working and worth building more of.
• Check this data regularly, not just once. Rankings shift over time as Google’s algorithm updates and as competitors publish new content, so revisiting this monthly gives you a much clearer picture of real trends versus a one-time snapshot.

Conclusion

That covers everything on using Google Search Console as a completely free keyword rank checker. Once it’s set up properly, this data becomes one of the most valuable free tools available for understanding exactly how your SEO efforts are actually paying off.

I hope you found this useful. For any questions or suggestions, feel free to leave a comment below, I’d be glad to hear from you.