Headings and named entities: Crawl Audit check 16

Short answer: the check is called "semantic entity extraction score", but what it measures is simple: how many different headings your page has, plus any organisation names in its structured data. Five or more distinct ones passes. Behind it is a real point. Headings that name the actual things on the page (your product, your service, your city) make the page easier for people and machines to understand than headings like "Welcome" and "Our story".

What Crawl Audit checks

Crawl Audit collects the text of every <h1>, <h2> and <h3> on the page, adds the name of any Organization-type node in your structured data, and counts how many are different.

• Pass: five or more distinct.
• Warning: fewer than five.

It doesn't judge whether the headings are good, only that they exist and differ. A short landing page with one big heading and no sections will warn, even if it's well written.

What Google says about headings

• Google's guide to helpful content asks: "Does the main heading or page title provide a descriptive, helpful summary of the content?"
• Its SEO Starter Guide says to "provide headings to help users navigate your pages", and adds that, from Google Search's point of view, "it doesn't matter if you're using them out of order."
• When Google writes the title link for a result, one of the sources it uses is "Heading elements, such as <h1> elements".
• Google's guidance on AI features says: "People generally appreciate it when web pages are organized by paragraphs and sections, along with headings that provide a clear structure to navigate content."

We found no Google statement about counting "named entities". The useful idea is simpler: say what things are called.

Headings that name things

The right-hand column tells a reader, and anything quoting your page, what the section is about without reading it. Keep one <h1> for the page's main subject, and use <h2> and <h3> for sections.

How to fix it on your platform

• WordPress: use the Heading block and pick H2 or H3, rather than making a paragraph bold and big.
• Shopify, Wix and Squarespace: use the editor's heading styles (Heading 2, Heading 3), not a large font on normal text. Only real heading styles produce heading tags.
• Next.js: use <h2> and <h3> elements, not styled <div>s.

Common mistakes

• Text styled to look like a heading that isn't one in the HTML. Machines only see the tag.
• Every section titled "Learn more". Repeated headings count once.
• Headings stuffed with keywords. Name the thing once, plainly.

Sources

• Google Search Central, Creating helpful, reliable, people-first content (updated 1 October 2026), checked 3 October 2026.
• Google Search Central, SEO Starter Guide and Title links.
• Google Search Central, guidance on AI features (updated 10 July 2026).