How to Check Google PageRank Online and Understand Website Authority
Website owners and SEO professionals often want to check Google PageRank online to understand how links may contribute to the authority of a webpage. PageRank is one of the most well-known concepts in search engine optimization and was originally developed by Google to analyze the importance of web pages based largely on their link relationships.
However, there is an important difference between Google's historical PageRank system and the public PageRank score that many SEO tools used to display.
What Is Google PageRank?
Google PageRank is a link-analysis system associated with Google's search technology. In simple terms, it evaluates the relationships between pages through links, with links from important pages historically carrying greater influence.
For many years, Google displayed a simplified PageRank score through its Toolbar, using a scale from 0 to 10. This public score became a popular reference among webmasters and SEO professionals.
Google eventually stopped publicly updating and displaying Toolbar PageRank. The public score was officially removed in 2016, although reporting at the time noted that PageRank-related data continued to be used internally by Google.
Can You Still Check Google PageRank Online?
Today, you cannot check an official, current Google Toolbar PageRank score because Google no longer provides that public 0–10 metric.
This is important when using websites that claim to show an exact current “Google PageRank.” Such numbers should not be treated as an official Google score. Instead, modern SEO tools generally provide their own authority or link-based metrics designed to help users evaluate domains and pages.
Therefore, when you check Google PageRank online  it is useful to understand whether a tool is displaying historical information, an independent SEO metric, or another measurement of website authority.
Why PageRank Still Matters for SEO
Although the old public score disappeared, the underlying concept remains important for understanding how links can influence search engines.
A website with relevant, trustworthy backlinks can have stronger authority signals than a site with many low-quality or unrelated links. This makes backlink research an important part of SEO analysis.
Rather than focusing only on an old PageRank number, website owners should examine backlink quality, referring domains, relevance, internal linking, content quality, and overall website performance.
Use Modern SEO Metrics Instead
If your goal is to check Google PageRank online, consider using modern SEO analysis tools to examine the factors that can provide meaningful information about a website's link profile.
Look at metrics such as referring domains, backlink quality, domain authority estimates, page-level link strength, and organic search visibility. These metrics are created by third-party platforms and should not be confused with an official Google PageRank score.
Final Thoughts
The phrase check Google PageRank online remains popular because PageRank played a major role in the history of SEO. However, Google's public Toolbar PageRank is no longer available. Google officially removed the public PageRank display in 2016.