RUCheck a website

The open RQI-64 methodology

How the indexes are calculated

The RankRuBot crawler opens the website home page, service files and DNS records, runs 64 checks and adds up the points. The total is converted into an index on a non-linear scale.

RQI=100 × (Σ points100)1.35
  • 90 → 86.75excellent website
  • 75 → 67.82good website
  • 60 → 50.14average website

The SEO index is calculated the same way, but only over the six categories that affect search: meta tags & social, content & markup, links, indexing & AI, speed and mobile (76.5 points scaled to 100). RQI covers all 8 categories, including security and trust.

Why 100.00 is almost unreachable: response time, page weight, text volume and internal linking are scored by smooth functions that approach the maximum but never reach it. On top of that, the power of 1.35 compresses the top of the scale. That is why Benchmark (96+) is already an exceptional result.

Leagues

  • Benchmarkfrom 96.00
  • Platinumfrom 90.00
  • Goldfrom 80.00
  • Silverfrom 65.00
  • Bronzefrom 50.00
  • Starterup to 49.99

64 checks

Meta tags & social SEO 17.5 points

CheckPointsHow to get full points
Page title (title tag)3Write a unique title of 30–65 characters: main keyword first, brand last.
Meta description3Write a 70–170 character description with a benefit, numbers and a call to action — it becomes your search snippet.
Main heading H12.5Keep exactly one H1 that states the page topic and echoes the title.
Heading structure H2–H61.5Build an H2 → H3 hierarchy without skipped levels so search engines and AI assistants understand the sections.
Open Graph: core tags1.5Add og:title, og:description, og:image, og:url and og:type — Telegram, Facebook, WhatsApp and AI assistants build the link card from them.
Social media image (og:image)1.5Use an absolute https URL to a 1200×630 JPG, PNG or WebP image (ideally under 300 KB) and add og:image:width, og:image:height and og:image:alt.
Open Graph correctness0.75Write tags as property="og:…" inside head with no duplicates; og:url must match the canonical URL; add og:site_name and og:locale (en_US).
X (Twitter) card0.5Add twitter:card with the value summary_large_image — without it X shows the link without a large image.
Social media profiles0.75Link to your official pages on social networks and list them in the sameAs field of your Organization markup — this is how search and AI connect the site to your brand.
Canonical URL1.5Add link rel="canonical" with the absolute page URL to protect against duplicates in search.
Page language0.5Add the lang attribute to the html tag, e.g. lang="en".
UTF-8 encoding0.5Declare UTF-8 with meta charset="utf-8" as the first tag in head.

Content & markup SEO 12.5 points

CheckPointsHow to get full points
Amount of text continuous3A home page benefits from 400–1000 words of meaningful text: what the site is about, who it is for and why you.
Text-to-code ratio1.5Reduce boilerplate: move styles and scripts to files and remove unnecessary wrappers.
Image descriptions (alt)2.5Give every meaningful image a descriptive alt — it helps image search and accessibility.
Schema.org markup1.5Add JSON-LD: Organization or LocalBusiness, WebSite, BreadcrumbList — for rich snippets and AI search.
JSON-LD correctness1.5Fix JSON syntax, set @context https://schema.org and @type, and fill in required fields: name and url for Organization, address for LocalBusiness, offers for Product.
Organization profile for AI1Describe the company in JSON-LD: Organization or LocalBusiness with name, url, logo, phone or address and sameAs — AI assistants and search use it to answer questions about you.
Site icon (favicon)1Add a favicon (SVG and a 32×32 PNG) — it shows in search results and browser tabs.
Obsolete tags and meta refresh0.5Remove font, center, marquee and meta refresh — use CSS and a 301 redirect instead.

Links SEO 9 points

CheckPointsHow to get full points
Internal links continuous3Link the home page to key sections: menu, service blocks, breadcrumbs, footer.
Link text2Every link needs clear text or an aria-label — an empty link helps neither people nor search engines.
External link balance1.5Do not turn the home page into a directory of other websites; mark ads with rel="sponsored".
Empty links (# and javascript:)1.5Replace href="#" and javascript: with real addresses or button elements.
Safe target="_blank"1Add rel="noopener" to links that open in a new tab.

Speed SEO 13.5 points

CheckPointsHow to get full points
Server response time (TTFB) continuous4.5Aim for under 200 ms: page caching, OPcache, fast hosting, a CDN.
HTML size continuous1.5Keep the home page HTML under 100 KB: remove inline styles and SVG, extra blocks, split long lists.
Brotli / gzip compression2.5Enable Brotli or gzip on the server — HTML becomes 3–5 times lighter.
Caching headers1.5Send Cache-Control and ETag or Last-Modified — repeat visits become instant.
HTTP/2 and HTTP/31.5Enable HTTP/2 — and HTTP/3 if your hosting allows — so resources load in parallel over one connection.
Render-blocking scripts and styles1Add defer or async to scripts in head; combine and minify CSS.
Redirect chain1Send visitors to the final address with a single 301 redirect, without intermediate hops.

Mobile SEO 7.5 points

CheckPointsHow to get full points
Mobile adaptation4Add meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1" and a responsive layout.
Zoom not disabled1Remove user-scalable=no and maximum-scale=1 — people need to enlarge text.
Responsive images1Serve images at the right size via srcset or picture, in WebP / AVIF.
Home-screen icon and manifest0.75Add a 180×180 apple-touch-icon and manifest.webmanifest so the site saves nicely to a phone screen.
Lazy-loading images0.75Add loading="lazy" to images below the first screen.

Indexing & AI SEO 16.5 points

CheckPointsHow to get full points
Home page status code3The home page must respond 200 OK without errors or placeholders.
robots.txt file2Create robots.txt with rules and a Sitemap line; never block the whole site.
sitemap.xml2.5Generate sitemap.xml with all important pages and list it in robots.txt and webmaster tools.
Indexing allowed2.5Remove noindex from meta robots and X-Robots-Tag if the page should be in search.
Proper 404 page1.5Missing URLs must return 404 with a helpful page — not 200 or a redirect to the home page.
www and non-www mirrors1Set up a 301 redirect from the secondary mirror to the primary one.
IPv6 availability0.5Add an AAAA record so the site opens on IPv6 mobile networks.
AI search crawler access1.5Do not block AI search crawlers in robots.txt — OAI-SearchBot, ChatGPT-User, PerplexityBot, Claude-SearchBot, YandexAdditional — or assistants cannot cite your site. Blocking training bots (GPTBot, ClaudeBot) is your right and does not lower the score.
llms.txt file1Publish /llms.txt in Markdown: a # heading with the name, a short > summary and ## sections linking to key pages — a business card of the site for AI models.
Quoting and previews allowed1Remove nosnippet, max-snippet:0 and noai from meta robots and X-Robots-Tag; add max-image-preview:large so search and AI answers can show text and a large image.

Security 14 points

CheckPointsHow to get full points
Secure HTTPS connection4Install an SSL certificate (Let’s Encrypt is free) and move the site to HTTPS.
Valid certificate2.5Install a certificate with the full chain issued for this domain.
Certificate validity1.5Turn on automatic renewal so the site never opens with a warning.
HTTP → HTTPS redirect2Set up a 301 redirect from all http addresses to https.
HSTS1Add Strict-Transport-Security: max-age=31536000; includeSubDomains.
Content-Security-Policy1Set a CSP — the main barrier against XSS and injected scripts.
Clickjacking protection0.5Add X-Frame-Options: SAMEORIGIN or the CSP frame-ancestors directive.
X-Content-Type-Options0.5Add the X-Content-Type-Options: nosniff header.
Referrer-Policy0.5Add Referrer-Policy: strict-origin-when-cross-origin.
Software versions hidden0.25Hide versions in the Server and X-Powered-By headers (server_tokens off, expose_php = Off).
No mixed content0.25Load all scripts, styles and images over https only.

Trust & compliance 9.5 points

CheckPointsHow to get full points
Privacy policy3Publish a privacy policy (152-FZ / GDPR) and link to it in the footer and at every form.
Contacts2Show a clickable phone and e-mail, an address and a contacts page.
Company details1.5Show the legal entity and registration numbers in the footer — trust for clients and a legal requirement for sellers.
Current year in the footer0.5Keep the copyright year up to date — an abandoned look scares clients away.
Web analytics1Connect an analytics service — without data you cannot tell what to improve. Remember cookie consent.
Domain e-mail protection (SPF, DMARC)1.5Add SPF and DMARC TXT records so your mail avoids spam folders and nobody can send e-mail as you.

RankRuBot crawler

Checks run with the User-Agent Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; RankRuBot/1.0; +https://rank.ru/bot). The crawler requests the home page, robots.txt, sitemap.xml, llms.txt, the favicon and one deliberately non-existent page. Internal and private addresses are never checked and no form data is sent.

If your website is behind bot protection, add RankRuBot to the allow list — otherwise the website cannot be rated.

FAQ

The essentials

What are the SEO index and RQI?

The SEO index shows how well a website is optimised for search: meta tags and social/AI markup, content, links, indexing, speed and mobile. RQI — the Rank Quality Index — rates the website as a whole: the same categories plus security, legal compliance and trust. Both run from 0.00 to 100.00.

Why doesn’t an excellent website score 100.00?

That is by design. The scale is non-linear, and speed, text volume and internal linking are scored continuously and are never perfect. 100.00 is absolute perfection in everything — you can only get closer to it.

How do I get a certificate?

Just check your website. If the home page opens and returns code 200, the website enters the rating and the registry, and a certificate with a number, a QR code and the Rank.Ru seals appears right away.

How often can I re-check?

No more than once every 10 minutes per website. A certificate is valid for 90 days — after that, renew it with a new check.

My website is behind bot protection

If protection (Cloudflare, DDoS-Guard, Qrator) blocks the crawler, the report shows the response code but the website is not rated. Allow the RankRuBot User-Agent.

Is this official certification?

It is a voluntary online assessment based on the open Rank.Ru methodology. It does not replace mandatory certification, but it clearly shows clients and partners that the website is well built.