A page has no viewport tag
In the reportViewport meta missing
viewport_meta_missing · Issue
This appears when a page's HTML has no viewport meta tag, or its first one is empty. Without it, phones may render the page as a wide desktop page and shrink it to fit the screen. Add <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width"> to the page's head.
Severity: Low. Fix this in the page template: without a viewport declaration, phones may use a wide desktop viewport and shrink the page instead of laying it out at the device width.
Why it matters
Some phones and other narrow screens render pages in a virtual window wider than the screen and then shrink the result to fit. A viewport meta tag tells them to use the device's own width.
What to do
- Add
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width">to the<head>of the page or its template;initial-scale=1is common, though usually unnecessary. - If the tag is already there, make sure the first viewport tag on the page is the filled one.
- Run a new audit once the change is live.
When to leave it as it is: if the page is deliberately designed for a fixed desktop width and you accept that phones shrink it, the tag can stay out; most sites want it.
What we read
We read the first <meta name="viewport"> in the HTML of each crawled page, without running JavaScript. A page is reported when there is none, or the first one has no content or only spaces; an empty first tag is reported even if a filled one follows, and any non-empty value passes without being checked.
Pages marked noindex and pages that name another page as canonical are checked too. Pages that are only a frame for scripts remain unknown because the received HTML cannot establish the final head; a page where scripts build part of the content is still checked, with medium confidence.
Example & evidence
Illustrative example — one page, not a live audit.
Address: https://bakery.example/about/. The head we read:
<head><meta charset="utf-8"><title>About our bakery</title></head>There is no viewport tag, so the page is reported.
A possible correction:
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1">A tag written with content="" would still be reported.
Confirm & check again
Check for yourself: view the page source and search for name="viewport".
Check again: Full audit — Run a new site audit. The finding closes when a sufficient check of the same HTML page finds a non-empty first viewport tag. A redirect, a non-HTML response or a page that is no longer reached does not by itself confirm a fix. A page that is only a shell for scripts remains unconfirmed.
Limits & sources
The check does not test whether the page works well on phones or whether the viewport value is sensible, and a viewport added by JavaScript is not seen. It reads the HTML our crawler received, not a version served only to phones.
Confidence: High when the page's HTML was read in full; on a page with signs that scripts build part of it, the finding is marked with medium confidence.
Sources
- MDN,
<meta name="viewport">HTML attribute value — explains that narrow screens may render a page in a wider virtual viewport and shrink it, and recommendswidth=device-width. Checked 25 September 2026.
Editorial review: 2 November 2026