Google Reindexing After Internal Link Changes

[EmilyDavis]

Hi everyone,

I recently updated the internal linking structure of a website with about 2,000 indexed pages. No URLs were changed, but I added new category hubs and redirected many internal links to improve crawl paths.

Google Search Console shows that the pages are still indexed, but the new internal link structure doesn't seem to be reflected in the "Links" report even after several weeks.

Has anyone experienced a long delay before Google recognized major internal linking changes without URL changes? Did requesting reindexing for key hub pages help speed up the process, or did you simply wait for Google to recrawl naturally?

I'd be interested to hear real-world experiences from sites with a few thousand pages or more.

Thanks!

 

[seoguyy]

GSC’s Links report is always a bit behind reality. Google can already be crawling and using your new internal structure, but that report updates very slowly in batches.
Submitting the main hub pages for reindexing can help Google pick up the new structure faster during crawling, but I have noticed it doesn’t really speed up the Links report itself, it just helps google process the new internal paths sooner on the crawl side.

 

[Riviera]

It took weeks. It took me 3-4 weeks (from June 5 to June 30), to see something really differrent in GSC. First week, just a bit, but the 4th week it showed more in GSC.
(I deleted a 10 years old website then left it blank for ~1 year. Then I reinstall and upload it again then).