How do I use the Time machine?

Press See the magic in the top bar, then Enter now on the Time machine tile. It works the same whatever your website is built with: everything it shows comes from history SEOmise already keeps for the project.

The dates

Every date is a card. The dates are your finished scans (Day 0 among them), a point at the end of each month between scans when there is other data for it (rank checks, backlink checks, Google data), and today. Older dates recede into the distance behind the one in front; newer ones fly past you when you go back in time. The timeline on the right lists the same dates, oldest at the top: dates near the pointer grow so they are easy to aim at, the one under the pointer is named, and the dark marker shows the date in front of you.

Moving through time

• Scroll over the cards, or drag them up and down.
• Click or drag on the timeline.
• With the keyboard: the up arrow or Page Up goes back a date, the down arrow or Page Down forward; Home goes to the first date and End to today.
• Day 0 and Now jump to Day 0 and to today.

The date you stop on goes into the address, so a link opens on the same date. When the screen opens, the cards flip back through your dates and land on today (or the date in the link): once per session unless your administrator changed it. Any click or key skips it. If your device asks for reduced motion there is no flip and no movement: the cards simply change.

The layers

The buttons above the cards switch layers on and off. Each layer is a sheet in its own colour, stacked behind the others on the card in front: click a sheet's heading to bring it forward.

• Website: the pages of the scan that date, as small tiles grouped by section. Pages added since the date before glow; pages removed show as dashed outlines. Click a tile to open the page panel.
• Keywords: your tracked searches and their positions on that date, with an arrow for the change since the date before. Click one to open it.
• Backlinks: the linking sites on that date, new ones glowing and lost ones crossed out, with the counts from the backlink check that stands for the date.
• Traffic: Search Console clicks and impressions and Analytics visits over the 28 days ending on the date (unless your administrator changed it), with the daily line.
• Local: the average position of your map rank grid, how much of the grid sees you, and your Business Profile reviews.
• AI visibility: the questions asked in the AI visibility check and whether the answers named you.
• Changes: the changes that reached your site in the period, as markers on its days. Click one to open it in Changes.

A layer that has no data at all is greyed out with the reason (for example "Connect Search Console" or "No rank checks yet"). A layer with no figure for one date says Not measured then; it never shows 0 for something that was not measured. A check counts for a date for 45 days (a setting); after that the date says not measured.

Between two dates

As you move between two dates the figures follow: positions, traffic and map positions move smoothly; pages, links and changes appear or go on the day they were really found or lost. While a date's detail is still loading, the nearest loaded date is shown, faded, with a small loading mark.

The line under the cards says what changed at that date since the date before, for example "+3 pages, 2 searches into the top 10, 5 new linking sites, clicks +18 %".

What changed

The panel beside the cards (a sheet from What changed on phones) compares the date in front with the date before, the first date or today. The first line sums it up from the figures, for example "Since 3 Mar 2026: +42 keywords, −3 backlinks, health 71 → 78." Under it, each layer that is on shows its gains in green and losses in red: pages added and removed, the health score and issues fixed or new; searches now found, no longer found, moved up and down, and the top movers; new and lost links and linking sites (only those your backlink checks confirmed); clicks, impressions and visits; the map position and reviews; the answers naming you; and the changes made. Click a figure to see its list. The biggest gain and the biggest loss of the period are flagged, and their sheets pulse. A layer without data for one of the two dates says why, for example "No keyword checks before 12 May 2026".

Full screen and phones

Full screen fills the screen with the cards, the panel and the timeline. On a phone the cards are smaller at the top, the layers follow as cards, and the timeline is a scrubber at the bottom.

Settings

Your administrator can change, under Settings → Policies → See the magic: whether the Time machine is on (while it is off it shows Beta with Ask for early access), how many dates it shows and how far back it looks, how many pages and rows each layer draws, how long a check counts for a date, the traffic period, what "top 10" means, the flip back (every time, once per session or never) and its length, what the panel compares with first, whether figures count up and down, and the timeline's magnification.