05 / Desktop crawler
SiteAuditLint is a desktop SEO crawler for Windows, macOS, and Linux that audits technical SEO, on-page elements, tracking and analytics tags, and AI search visibility in one crawl. It focuses on turning crawl results into prioritized actions and sharing them with teams.
This lesson walks through SiteAuditLint's workflow, its main check categories, and how it fits alongside the other tools in this course.
1. What SiteAuditLint is
SiteAuditLint runs on your own computer and stores crawl data locally, as explained in where your data lives. Install guides are available for Windows and macOS and Linux, and plans are described in editions and licensing.
2. What SiteAuditLint checks
| Category | Examples |
|---|---|
| Technical SEO | Status codes, redirects and chains, canonicals, noindex, robots.txt, XML sitemaps |
| On-page SEO | Titles, meta descriptions, headings, image alt text, thin and duplicate content |
| Links | Broken internal and external links, orphan pages, deep pages, anchor text |
| Security | HTTPS, mixed content, HSTS |
| Tracking and analytics | GA4 and GTM setup, duplicate containers, double firing tags, consent, PII in URLs |
| AI visibility | AI crawler access, structured data, question-based content, llms.txt |
Each check is documented in the issue library.
3. Tracking and tag audits
Few crawlers audit analytics setup. SiteAuditLint detects pages missing tracking, multiple GTM containers, tags firing before consent, and personal data in URLs. See the Google Tag Manager audit guide and tracking and pixels guide.
4. The SiteAuditLint workflow
- Configure and crawlSet crawl settings, including rendering and speed, then run the audit.
- Review the health scoreUse the site health score as a trend and check severity levels.
- Build the action planUse the action plan to order fixes.
- Share findingsExport HTML reports, send Slack notifications, or create Linear tickets.
- Schedule and compareRun scheduled audits and compare crawls to confirm fixes.
5. AI visibility checks
The AI visibility checks test major AI crawler user agents against robots.txt, flag blocked AI crawlers, and review structured data and answer-ready content. They connect directly to the AI Search course.
6. Strengths and limits
| Strengths | Limits |
|---|---|
| Technical, on-page, tracking, and AI checks in one crawl | Not a keyword or backlink database, so pair it with research tools or import backlinks |
| Local data storage | Very large crawls depend on local hardware |
| Action plan, Slack, and Linear workflows | Estimated competitor traffic is outside its scope |
7. Building a toolbox
| Need | Tool type |
|---|---|
| Technical audit and tracking checks | Desktop crawler such as SiteAuditLint, Screaming Frog, or Sitebulb |
| Keyword and competitor research | Semrush or Ahrefs |
| Backlink analysis | Ahrefs or Semrush, imported into audits |
| What Google actually indexes | Google Search Console |
| AI citations | Prompt tracking and AI referral analytics |
Compare options on the comparison hub.
8. Practical exercise: Run your first SiteAuditLint audit
Follow the first audit guide and complete the checklist.
SiteAuditLint checklist
0 of 9 tasks completed
Key takeaways
- SiteAuditLint is a desktop crawler for Windows, macOS, and Linux.
- It combines technical, on-page, tracking, and AI visibility checks.
- Tracking audits cover GA4, GTM, consent, and PII issues.
- Action plans, reports, Slack, and Linear turn findings into tasks.
- Pair it with research tools and Search Console for a complete toolbox.
Knowledge check
You have completed SEO Tools. Next, learn how to turn audit data into clear reports in SEO Reporting.