What is CLS by Search Engine
CLS by Search Engine shows how traffic from different search engines impacts the Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) on your pages.
This lens helps you identify whether visitors arriving from search engines like Google, Bing, or DuckDuckGo are experiencing visual instability — such as elements jumping around—when landing on your site.
Only search engines active and measurable during the selected period are listed.
CLS is a Core Web Vital that reflects how stable your layout is as the page loads and becomes visible.
Healthy CLS by Search Engine sample
In a healthy scenario, users from any search engine experience a stable page load with minimal or no layout shifts. You may see various search engines listed, but if they don’t trigger yellow or red CLS warnings, your site handles their traffic well.
A healthy setup typically includes:
Optimized above-the-fold layout for all landing pages.
Reserved space for dynamic content like ads or banners.
No surprise element shifts triggered by URL parameters or referrer-specific scripts.
If CLS values stay green across all search engine sources, you’re delivering a visually stable experience to organic visitors.
Unhealthy CLS by Search Engine sample
When CLS is impacted by a specific search engine, it usually means the landing experience for users from that source is unstable. This can happen due to:
Dynamic elements loading late or with no reserved space.
Personalization or A/B testing scripts activating only for search traffic.
Redirects or tracking URLs injecting extra elements mid-load.
Device or network differences common to certain search engine users.
Examples include:
Visitors from Bing seeing layout jumps due to late-loaded hero images, or Google traffic triggering popups or floating CTAs without spacing adjustments.
If you consistently see yellow or red CLS values for a particular search engine, it’s a sign that visitors from that source are experiencing distracting layout shifts.
Resolving unhealthy CLS by Search Engine
Go-to action plan to resolve an unhealthy CLS by Search Engine:
Ask Uxi to analyze your CLS by Search Engine values and suggest improvements
Use Filters to narrow down to landing pages and traffic sources with high CLS.
Simulate CLS of the suspected lens to see if fixing it will resolve the CLS by Search Engine. If yes, this is where the resolution focus should be.
Use an automated CLS optimization tool like Navigation AI to improve your CLS by Search Engine values
Once you’ve improved CLS, set an alert to be the first to know if it starts worsening again.
Try it yourself
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