Google's John Mueller did some myth busting this morning around HTTPS. There are always some SSL providers trying to use Google's HTTPS ranking signal in their marketing efforts. One said that "Without an SSL Certificate Google is likely to drop your website in search results." That is not true and John Mueller said so.
John replied to this on Twitter saying "Yeah, that's wrong." "HTTPS is not a factor in deciding whether or not to index a page, at all," he added.
He did explain that Google does "use HTTPS as a light-weight ranking factor, and having HTTPS is great for users."
Yeah, that's wrong. HTTPS is not a factor in deciding whether or not to index a page, at all. We do use HTTPS as a light-weight ranking factor, and having HTTPS is great for users. A free certificate from Let's Encrypt works just as well.
— 🍌 John 🍌 (@JohnMu) January 29, 2019
So don't fall for it - you don't need it to be indexed by Google.
Forum discussion at Twitter.
