Kong Metrics
Back to Blog
gsc-tips data-analytics

The Problem with 16 Months of GSC Data (And How to Fix It)

Kong Metrics Team · · 3 min read

Google Search Console is arguably the most important tool in an SEO's arsenal. But it has a fatal flaw built directly into its core: a strict, unavoidable 16-month data retention limit.

On the first day of the 17th month, your oldest day of SEO data is permanently, irreversibly deleted from Google's servers.

For businesses that rely on long-term organic growth, this "16-month cliff" is a disaster for reporting, forecasting, and strategic planning.

The 16-Month Cliff

To understand why this is a problem, consider the reality of SEO: it is a long-term investment. Content you publish today might not reach its peak ranking for 8 to 12 months.

If you are trying to analyze the lifecycle of a piece of content over 2 or 3 years, GSC simply cannot help you.

Year-over-Year (YoY) Analysis Limits

The most significant casualty of the 16-month limit is YoY reporting.

If your business is highly seasonal (e.g., you sell winter coats, or you are a B2B SaaS with heavy Q1 signups), you cannot compare month-over-month data. Comparing December to July is useless. You must compare December 2026 to December 2025.

With 16 months of data, you can barely scrape together one YoY comparison. You absolutely cannot compare Black Friday 2026 to Black Friday 2024 to see the long-term trend of your category pages.

Building a GSC Data Warehouse

The only way to solve this problem is to extract the data from Google's servers before it gets deleted and store it in your own database.

Historically, this meant utilizing the GSC API and connecting it to Google BigQuery. While effective, this requires data engineering resources, SQL queries, and managing cloud billing.

The Kong Metrics Solution

Kong Metrics eliminates the 16-month cliff instantly, with zero code.

As soon as you connect your GSC account, Kong Metrics begins pulling your historical data via the API and storing it in a secure, dedicated data warehouse.

  • Infinite Retention: We never delete your data. Month 17, Year 3, or Year 5—your entire search history remains instantly accessible.
  • True YoY Reporting: With permanent data storage, Kong Metrics enables seamless multi-year comparisons. You can finally see the true, long-term ROI of your SEO campaigns.
  • Accurate Forecasting: Because we store multi-year data, the Traffic Forecasting models in Kong Metrics can accurately detect annual seasonality, producing vastly more reliable projections than models limited to 16 months.

Don't let Google delete your most valuable marketing data. Secure your historical footprint today.