Quickstart: Run a Search Console App in Python

Complete the steps described in the rest of this page, and you'll have a simple Search Console app that fetches a list of sites verified in your Search Console account and lists any sitemap files submitted.

To run a quickstart example you'll need:

  • Access to the internet and a web browser, in order to authorize the sample app.
  • A Google account with at least one website verified in Google Search Console.
  • An environment to run programs in your selected language.

Step 1: Enable the Search Console API

To get started using Google Search Console API, you need to first use the setup tool, which guides you through creating a project in the Google API Console, enabling the API, and creating credentials.

  1. From the Credentials page, click Create credentials > OAuth client ID to create your OAuth 2.0 credentials or Create credentials > Service account key to create a service account.
  2. If you created an OAuth client ID, then select your application type.
  3. Fill in the form and click Create.

Your application's client IDs and service account keys are now listed on the Credentials page. For details, click a client ID; parameters vary depending on the ID type, but might include email address, client secret, JavaScript origins, or redirect URIs.

Take note of the Client ID as you'll need to add it to your code later.

Step 2: Install the Google Client Library

To install the Google API Python Client on a system, use either the pip command or easy_install command. 

easy_install --upgrade google-api-python-client

pip install --upgrade google-api-python-client

If you need to access the Google API Python Client from a Google App Engine project, follow the instructions here.

Step 3: Set up the sample

The next step is to copy and modify some sample code so that it can authenticate with the unique Client ID and Client Secret you created in the "Enable the Search Console API" step.

  1. After following the directions below to copy source code, replace YOUR_CLIENT_ID with the Client ID you generated in the "Enable the Google Search Console API" step.
  2. Replace YOUR_CLIENT_SECRET with your Client Secret, also generated previously.

Copy the following source code to webmasters-quickstart.py.

#!/usr/bin/python

import httplib2

from apiclient import errors
from apiclient.discovery import build
from oauth2client.client import OAuth2WebServerFlow


# Copy your credentials from the console
CLIENT_ID = 'YOUR_CLIENT_ID'
CLIENT_SECRET = 'YOUR_CLIENT_SECRET'

# Check https://developers.google.com/webmaster-tools/search-console-api-original/v3/ for all available scopes
OAUTH_SCOPE = 'https://www.googleapis.com/auth/webmasters.readonly'

# Redirect URI for installed apps
REDIRECT_URI = 'urn:ietf:wg:oauth:2.0:oob'

# Run through the OAuth flow and retrieve credentials
flow = OAuth2WebServerFlow(CLIENT_ID, CLIENT_SECRET, OAUTH_SCOPE, REDIRECT_URI)
authorize_url = flow.step1_get_authorize_url()
print 'Go to the following link in your browser: ' + authorize_url
code = raw_input('Enter verification code: ').strip()
credentials = flow.step2_exchange(code)

# Create an httplib2.Http object and authorize it with our credentials
http = httplib2.Http()
http = credentials.authorize(http)

webmasters_service = build('webmasters', 'v3', http=http)

# Retrieve list of properties in account
site_list = webmasters_service.sites().list().execute()

# Filter for verified websites
verified_sites_urls = [s['siteUrl'] for s in site_list['siteEntry']
                       if s['permissionLevel'] != 'siteUnverifiedUser'
                          and s['siteUrl'][:4] == 'http']

# Print the URLs of all websites you are verified for.
for site_url in verified_sites_urls:
  print site_url
  # Retrieve list of sitemaps submitted
  sitemaps = webmasters_service.sitemaps().list(siteUrl=site_url).execute()
  if 'sitemap' in sitemaps:
    sitemap_urls = [s['path'] for s in sitemaps['sitemap']]
    print "  " + "\n  ".join(sitemap_urls)

Step 4: Run the sample

After you have enabled the API in the Google Developers Console, installed the Google API client library, and set up the sample source code, the sample is ready to run. Running the sample from the command line returns a URL you need to visit in order to authorize the sample to access data on behalf of the current user.

Run the sample using python webmasters-quickstart.py.

  1. Browse to the provided URL in your web browser.
  2. If you are not already logged into your Google account, you will be prompted to log in. If you are logged into multiple Google accounts, you will be asked to select one account to use for the authorization.
  3. Copy the code you're given after browsing to the link, and paste it into the prompt Enter authorization code:. Click Enter.

When you finish these steps, the sample prints the primary email address for all the users in the domain.

Next Steps

If your goal is to expand the quickstart sample into something for your own installed application, consult the API Reference. The API Reference discusses all of the features of the Search Console API.