Have you ever been notified by Google that its systems are unable to view your store on desktop and/or mobile devices? If yes, you should know that if you don’t resolve these GMC errors promptly, your products will stay disabled, meaning you will not be able to promote them with Shopping ads or even free product listings.
These errors, ‘Unable to view store on desktop’ and ‘Unable to view store mobile’, can occur for many reasons, some of which can even be technical issues surrounding your website’s configuration, such as the robots.txt file being inaccessible, having too many redirects, etc.
The good news is that both of these errors are easy to fix. This blog explains how to do that.
Through this guide, we will discuss the ‘Unable to view store on desktop’ and ‘Unable to view store mobile’ GMC errors in detail. We will discuss what these errors are, their common causes, how to fix them, and some tips that will help you prevent them from occurring again in your GMC.
Table of Contents
Understanding the Errors
First, let’s start by understanding what these errors mean.
| Note: Both ‘Unable to view store on desktop’ and ‘Unable to view store on mobile’ can appear as critical errors or warnings. But to predict exactly whether the error will show as an error, warning, or informational notice depends on your account history and past violations. Ultimately, Google’s policy team makes the final decision. |
Unable to View Store on Desktop
You will notice the ‘Unable to view store on desktop’ error when Google cannot access the product landing pages for one or more items in your GMC from desktop device user agents. This mainly happens when the URL values that you submit with the link [link] or link template [link_template] attributes are invalid or inaccessible.
Google disables all items affected by this error. This is because the unavailability of a product’s landing page can lead to poor shopping experiences for users, which Google doesn’t want.
Unable to View Store on Mobile
This error occurs when Google, using its mobile device user agents, cannot access one or more products’ landing pages that you submitted with the mobile link [mobile_link] attribute.
Even for this error, Google will disable the affected products to ensure that users don’t face any poor experiences.
| Note: The mobile link [mobile_link] attribute is optional and allows you to submit a URL to a mobile version of your product’s landing page. In case Google has issues crawling the link submitted via the mobile link attribute, and even if the landing page URL submitted with the required link [link] attribute or link template [link_template] is accessible, Google will still disable your products. The landing page URL should be accessible and valid across both attributes. |
Common Reasons for the ‘Unable to view store on Desktop and Mobile’ Errors
Since ‘Unable to view store on desktop’ and ‘Unable to view store on mobile’ errors occur for similar reasons, we’re discussing them together in this section.
Those reasons include:
- 404 Error (Page not found): The link [link] or link template [link_template] attribute values for desktop devices, and/or the mobile link [mobile_link] attribute values for mobile devices lead to landing pages that don’t exist.
- Multiple Redirects: Google finds that there are too many redirects before a user actually lands on your product landing page.
- Server Errors or Downtime: Your server returns a HTTP 5xx error or fails to connect when Google attempts to load the product landing page, and the crawlers (used by Google) conclude that your page is unavailable.
- Robots.txt blocking: Your robots.txt file doesn’t allow Google to access and crawl any item’s landing page.
- Hostname not resolvable: Google is unable to locate your website because it can’t match your domain to an IP address. As a result, it fails to crawl both your website and/or mobile pages.
- URL issues: The URLs that you submit either with the [link] (or [link_template]) attributes and/or [mobile_link] attributes:
- Do not start with ‘http://’ or ‘https:/’; or
- Do not point to domains that are exactly similar to your verified and claimed domain in GMC.
- Regional availability issues: You are using Google’s ‘Regional availability and pricing’ add-on feature, but Google cannot crawl your region-specific URLs.
This means that Google’s crawlers fail to access landing pages with region IDs.
Examples of such URLs include:
- https://examplestore.com/p/productlandingpage?region_id=32145
- https://examplestore.com/p?offer=myproduct®ion_id=32145
- Content Requiring Interaction or Login: Your product landing page requires any type of action once visited, such as logging in, or is hidden behind pop-ups, due to which Google concludes that it is blocked or empty.
- Online store theme issues: Your store is on a third-party platform like Shopify, and its theme doesn’t allow Google to properly crawl product landing pages.
- Miscellaneous crawl errors: There are other network issues, or your product landing pages load very slowly, so Google cannot access them.
How to Fix the ‘Unable to view store on Desktop and Mobile’ Errors?
Let’s now learn how to resolve these issues.
| Note: Just like the common errors that we discussed in the previous section, we will discuss the process to resolve both these errors together. This is because both processes (for desktop and mobile landing page URLs) are very similar. |
Step 1: Identify the Affected Products in GMC
- In your GMC, go to “Products” and then “Needs Attention.”
- Scroll down to “All products that need attention.”
- Then click on the filter icon and select “What needs attention.” Further, select one or both of the ‘Unable to view store on desktop’ and ‘Unable to view store on mobile’ errors.
- You will get a list of products currently affected by either one or both of these Google Merchant Center errors.
Step 2: Manually check the URL of affected item(s)
- From the list of affected items we generated in the previous step, click on any product’s title. That will take you to the product details page.
- Click on the URL in the “Product page on your website.”
- For mobile, copy the same URL and save it in a tool like Google Keep or email it to yourself. Then, open the link directly on your mobile device.
- Then identify the issue. Why wasn’t Google able to crawl (or view) your page?
- Is the page unavailable? Are you getting a 404 error?
- Does it take too long to load?
- Are there too many redirects?
- Your page loads, but maybe it’s the robots.txt file that didn’t allow Google to crawl it?
- Or is it that the link or mobile link attribute’s values are invalid?
| Note: Refer to the previous section to go through all possible reasons why Google couldn’t access your desktop or mobile-optimized product landing page. |
Step 3: Use Google’s URL Inspection Tool (Optional but Recommended)
If your product’s landing page isn’t available due to a standard 404 error or some feed issue (eg, Incorrect link or mobile link attribute values), then you can resolve it easily.
But if your page is available and yet Google isn’t able to crawl it, or if you notice a server error (HTTP 5xx), you should check the product landing page URL with Google’s URL Inspection tool on Search Console.
It can help you to:
- Check the status of your product page’s URL in Google’s index
- Inspect a live URL
- Request indexing for pages (if they aren’t already indexed)
- See a screenshot of how Googlebot sees your page, which helps check if important content is loading correctly.
And many other things.
For example, you may see an error like “Failed: Robots.txt unreachable,” as shown in the screenshot below.
This means that Googlebot couldn’t access your robots.txt file, which prevents it from crawling and indexing your product page. As a result, your page will remain unavailable in Google Shopping ads and free listings until this issue is fixed.
| Note: The screenshot and example shared above are just for illustrative purposes. |
Step 4: Fix the Issue
Then, you must fix the issue that you identified during steps 2 and 3.
This means that:
- If there are 404 errors or broken links, ensure that the product page is live and accessible by Google’s crawlers from any device or location.
For example, if you, as a Shopify merchant, are getting a 404 error, check if the product status is set to ‘Active’ or ‘Draft’ in your Shopify admin.
This is because often when merchants don’t want to sell a product, they change its status to draft and forget to remove it from their data feed. This means that your feed on GMC includes the item, but its landing page is unavailable for Google’s bots and even users. As a result, Google flags it with either or both the ‘Unable to view store on desktop’ and ‘Unable to view store on mobile’ errors.
- If you notice HTTP 5xx errors, you must check your hosting setup or fix any server crashes.
| Note: In the next section, we have shared best practices to prevent all common errors. You can jump directly to it and read the solutions for each specific reason in detail to prevent these errors from affecting your products in GMC. |
Step 5: Resubmit Your Feed
Once you resolve the landing page accessibility issues, you should resubmit your entire data feed on GMC using your original product upload method. This is important because it ensures that your entire inventory data, along with accurate link or mobile link attribute values, gets refreshed on Google Merchant Center.
Additionally, for both ‘Unable to view store on desktop’ and ‘Unable to view store on mobile’ GMC errors, you can also request a website review, which can help speed up the reapproval process for all affected items. To request that review, simply click on the product’s title, go to the “Needs attention” tab, navigate to either one of the two or both errors, and click on ‘Request website review.’
But remember, for requesting this website check, your GMC should have a verified and claimed website. Additionally, if you choose not to request this website check, Google will still automatically review your website at a later point in time (which hasn’t been officially specified by Google).
Step 6: Monitor the changes
After you request a review, Google will take up to 12 hours to review your website. During this period, you shouldn’t request another review.
If the issue is resolved, it will disappear within 2 days, and your products will no longer be listed on the “Needs Attention” tab. Moreover, your products will also start appearing in Shopping ads and free product listings.
However, if Google finds that your landing pages are still inaccessible on any device type, it will notify you about the same errors again on the “Needs Attention” tab. And in case you are uncertain how to proceed further, and why the issue hasn’t been resolved even after your updates, you can reach out to Google’s support team.
Prevention Tips to Avoid Future Errors
Earlier in the blog, we discussed how to handle the ‘404 error’ and some of its specific edge cases (e.g., Shopify product status set to ‘draft’) to help Google access your landing pages.
Let’s now also look at how to prevent other common issues that can lead to the ‘Unable to view store on desktop and mobile’ errors.
- Limit Redirects: Google recommends that you limit the number of redirects on your product landing page to 2.
- Check Your robots.txt File: Your robots.txt file shouldn’t block both Google’s user agents, ‘Googlebot’ and ‘AdsBot’, from accessing your product landing pages. To ensure that, you will need to allow Google to crawl your full site.
That is simple to execute, just by updating your robots.txt file as shown below:
“User-agent: Googlebot
Disallow:
User-agent: Googlebot-image
Disallow:”
- Avoid Blocking Product Pages: Don’t block your product pages with any type of pop-ups, or there shouldn’t be any conditions like logging in or signing up to view those pages. Moreover, there shouldn’t be any type of authentication required either.
- Improve Page Speed: Ensure that your product pages load quickly. We recommend using the Google PageSpeed Insights tool. This tool allows you to easily analyze the time taken by your product pages across mobile and desktop devices.
| Pro tip: As a best practice, all merchants try to ensure that their page loads within 2.5 seconds. |
- Monitor Server Health: Your web server should always be up and running for both desktop and mobile devices. You can use websites like ‘Down for Everyone or just me’ to check if any of your product landing pages or your entire website is not accessible just for you or for everyone.
In case your website is not accessible to anyone, contact your hosting provider to resolve server issues and ensure that your domain is active.
- Use Valid URL Formats: Your URLs should be in a valid format and start with ‘http://’ or ‘https:/’
- Match Verified Domains: The product landing page URLs should point toward a domain that is your officially claimed and verified domain in GMC. Otherwise, your items are prone to disapproval, either due to ‘Unable to view store on desktop’ or ‘Unable to view store on mobile’ errors, or even the ‘Mismatched domains’ error.
- Submit Accurate Attribute Values: The values that you submit for link or link template and mobile link attributes should be accurate. If there are any typos and you submit invalid values, Google’s crawlers will fail to access your product landing pages and disable your items in GMC.
As a pro tip, we recommend you use a feed management software. Such tools allow you to add valid and accurate values for the link, link attribute, and mobile link attributes, and ensure that your data is synced to GMC instantly and without any inconsistencies.
- Address Private IP or Firewall Blocks: Configure your firewall or security settings to ensure that Google’s crawlers can easily access and crawl your website. Moreover, make sure that your website’s server is publicly accessible.
- Allow Google to crawl pages with region IDs: As discussed earlier, when you are using the ‘regional availability and pricing’ add-on feature, specific region IDs are appended to your product URLs.
Ensure that your robots.txt file doesn’t include ‘Disallow: /*?region_id=’ as otherwise Googlebot will not be able to crawl those pages.
Moreover, these product landing pages with region IDs must load and return a valid HTTP 200 response.
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Conclusion and Key Takeaways
It is always a stressful situation whenever Google alerts merchants that their products have been disabled because its systems were unable to view their store on mobile or desktop devices. But both these are very easy to prevent and fix with the right approach.
The key takeaways from this article include:
- Always ensure that the product landing page URL values that you submit with link [link] or link template [link_template] and mobile link [mobile_link] attributes are valid and lead to actual products that you are actively selling.
- Ensure that the domain these URLs lead to is the same domain that you have already verified and claimed in GMC.
- Moreover, these URLs should be properly formatted and include ‘http://’ or ‘https:/’.
- Apart from that, ensure that your product landing pages don’t have too many redirects, blockages (via pop-ups or other actions) that do not allow Google’s crawlers to access them.
- Lastly, always ensure that your product pages load quickly, your server’s health is strong, your domain settings are correct, and your firewall or security settings do not block Google’s crawlers.
Good luck.
FAQs
- What should I do if my page works fine for me, but Google still shows the error?
This can happen when your server or firewall blocks Google’s crawlers specifically. There is also a chance that your robots.txt file is at fault. Double-check these elements, and also test the page in the URL inspection tool to get any insights that can help you make your page accessible to Google.
- Can I still run ads if only a few products have these errors?
Yes, your other approved products can continue to run ads and appear in listings. But remember, this is only true if none of the ‘Unable to view store on desktop’ or ‘Unable to view store on mobile’ have escalated into egregious policy violations, due to which Google has suspended your GMC.
- Do I need to fix mobile and desktop errors separately?
Unless there is an issue with the attribute values, where let’s say both the link and mobile link attribute values have invalid values, you generally don’t need to fix them separately. Fixing the main underlying problem (like making the landing page accessible or correcting one URL) usually resolves both errors together for desktop and mobile.
- How often should I check for these errors?
We recommend that merchants check the “Needs Attention” tab, where Google highlights all types of product-level and account-level issues daily. That can help catch any new issues early.
- Can I prevent these errors completely?
It’s unlikely to eliminate these errors forever. However, by following the prevention tips in this blog — like using correct attribute values and ensuring fast-loading pages — you can greatly reduce the chances of encountering them.
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