---
title: "Change Detection & Alerts - Serpwise Documentation"
description: "Automatically detect SEO-critical title, description, canonical, robots, heading, and content changes between crawls."
url: "https://serpwise.ai/docs/change-detection/"
source: "https://serpwise.ai/docs/change-detection/"
---
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**Change Detection** automatically identifies SEO-critical changes between crawls. Every time a page is re-crawled, the system compares the new version against the previous snapshot and flags differences - from title changes to robots directive modifications - with severity levels so you can prioritize what needs attention.

* * *

## What Is Tracked

The following changes are detected and categorized:

| Change Type             | Severity | Description                                             |
|-------------------------|----------|---------------------------------------------------------|
| **Title changed**       | Warning  | The `<title>` tag content changed                       |
| **Description changed** | Warning  | The meta description changed                            |
| **Canonical changed**   | Critical | The canonical URL changed - can affect indexing         |
| **Robots changed**      | Critical | Meta robots or X-Robots-Tag directives changed          |
| **H1 changed**          | Warning  | The primary `<h1>` heading changed                      |
| **Status code changed** | Critical | HTTP status code changed (e.g. 200 → 404)               |
| **Schema changed**      | Warning  | JSON-LD structured data was added, removed, or modified |
| **Content changed**     | Info     | Content hash changed - indicates a content update       |

* * *

## Severity Levels

Each detected change is assigned a severity level:

| Severity     | Color | When It’s Used                                        | Examples                                                          |
|--------------|-------|-------------------------------------------------------|-------------------------------------------------------------------|
| **Critical** | Red   | Changes that can directly impact indexing or rankings | Canonical changed, robots added `noindex`, status code became 404 |
| **Warning**  | Amber | Changes worth reviewing but not immediately dangerous | Title rewritten, H1 modified, description changed                 |
| **Info**     | Blue  | Routine updates that may not need action              | Content updated, schema types modified                            |

Use severity filtering to focus on what matters most - critical changes first, then warnings.

* * *

## Per-URL Timeline

On the [URL Detail](/docs/pages-overview) page, click the **Changes** tab to see a chronological timeline of all detected changes for that URL.

Each entry shows:

- **Timestamp** - when the change was detected (i.e. when the re-crawl happened)
- **Change type** - what changed (title, canonical, etc.)
- **Severity badge** - critical, warning, or info
- **Before/after values** - the old and new content side by side

Filter the timeline by severity to focus on the most impactful changes.

* * *

## Domain-Wide Change Feed

The domain dashboard includes an aggregate change feed showing recent changes across all pages. This gives you a bird’s-eye view of what’s shifting across your site without checking each URL individually.

A **badge count** on the domain dashboard highlights the number of critical changes detected since your last review - so you can spot issues quickly.

* * *

## How Changes Are Detected

Changes are detected by comparing the current crawl snapshot against the previous one for the same URL:

- **Metadata changes** - direct comparison of title, description, canonical, robots, and H1 values
- **Schema changes** - JSON-LD structures are compared for additions, removals, and modifications
- **Content changes** - content hash comparison identifies when the page body has changed

[**Pages & URL Detail**  
→  
\
Access the Changes tab on any URL Detail page.](/docs/pages-overview)

[**Edge Crawler**  
→  
\
Configure crawl schedules to enable regular change detection.](/docs/edge-crawler)

[**Site-Wide SEO Dashboard**  
→  
\
See aggregate change trends across your domain.](/docs/seo-dashboard)