Google Merchant Center suspension guide

Google Merchant Center “website needs improvement”

Last reviewed against Google policy: October 2026

Google will not send Shopping traffic to a destination that does not load, is under construction, or is unnecessarily hard to use. The landing-page requirements say the page has to show the product you submitted, including a title, description, image, price, currency, availability, and a way to buy, and that those details should match the product data. “Website needs improvement” in a suspension notice often points at this area or at misrepresentation. Check the account for the exact wording.

Landing page requirements on Google Merchant Center Help

What “the page has to work” means

Google’s help for “landing page not working” says the URL should not return a 4xx or 5xx, should not be a parked or unfinished site, and should load for the locations you target. A firewall that blocks US crawlers, or a robots.txt that blocks AdsBot-Google or Googlebot, can make the page look broken to Merchant Center even when it opens in your browser.

The same help page says to allow Googlebot and Googlebot-image, then request a website check or a review from Diagnostics once the fix is live. Recrawls are not instant. Google’s documentation has described that kind of check taking on the order of 12 to 48 hours, and longer when a manual review is involved.

Trust and navigation, separate from the feed

A page can load and still fail a review if the store does not look like a functioning shop: no way to reach a cart, broken menu links, no contact path, or a checkout that jumps to a different brand. HTTPS is required for a store you expect Google to crawl and for any page that takes payment details.

Mobile matters even when you also submit a mobile link. Google’s link attribute requirements say the landing page has to work on desktop and mobile.

How to use a scan here

Run the free scan against the same domain you verified in Merchant Center. Look at HTTP errors, missing cart or contact paths, and broken links first, because those block a crawl. Then fix the softer issues, such as a missing contact method, and request the review after the pages respond with a normal 200.

What the free scan checks

HTTPS and whether the homepage returns an error or times out
A reachable cart or checkout path
Broken links in the main navigation
Basic trust signals: contact details, and pages that are not empty placeholders

Questions

The site loads for me. Why would Google say it does not?

Crawlers come from different networks. Geo-blocks, bot rules, a password page, and a robots.txt disallow are common reasons a merchant can browse the site while Merchant Center cannot. Test in a private window and check robots.txt for Googlebot and AdsBot-Google.

Is a slow site the same as a suspension for website quality?

A timeout or an error status is a destination failure. A merely slow page is a weaker signal. The account issue tells you which one Google recorded. Fix hard failures before you spend time on design.

Do I have to add review widgets and trust badges?

Google’s landing-page requirements do not say you must display a review widget. They do require a working page that shows the product and its price and that is not misleading. Extra badges do not replace a page that 404s.

Which domain should I scan?

Scan the domain registered on the Merchant Center business information, including the same host shoppers land on. A scan of a staging host will not match the URLs in the product data.

Run a free scan

Rule-based checks on the public site. The AI pass is part of the paid audit.

Other guides: What a Google Merchant Center misrepresentation suspension means · Google Merchant Center policy violation suspension · Google Merchant Center product data and feed issues