On 27 October 2026 we automatically visited the home pages of 321 websites of businesses in Genoa, taken from OpenStreetMap. 22% don’t work (71 out of 318): in most cases the domain no longer exists. Among the websites that work, only 12% show their main content within 2.5 seconds on a phone with a slow connection (28 out of 225), and 49% have neither a tap-to-call phone number nor a WhatsApp link (113 out of 232).
How many websites of businesses in Genoa actually work? Do they look right on a phone? Do they tell Google, and assistants like ChatGPT, who they are and where they are? To answer with numbers rather than impressions, we took the businesses in Genoa that list a website on OpenStreetMap and measured their home pages with the same tools we use to check our clients’ websites.
On this page you’ll only find overall figures, always shown with the total they are based on. We don’t publish business names or rankings. The method and its limits are explained at the end.
The numbers at a glance.
More than one in five doesn’t work.
Of the 318 websites whose availability we could check, 71 don’t work (22%). The most common case is a domain that no longer exists: 52 addresses out of 318 (16%) lead nowhere. The others return an error, don’t open within 20 seconds or have an invalid security certificate, which makes the browser show a warning.
| Category | Not working |
|---|---|
| Restaurants, bars and cafés | 30% (34 out of 114) |
| Hotels, B&Bs and hostels | 20% (13 out of 64) |
| Shops and beauty salons | 17% (24 out of 140) |
| Total | 22% (71 out of 318) |
What it means: sometimes the business has closed or changed website and the listing was never updated. But an old address can linger for years on Google, on social media and on business cards, and whoever opens it finds a blank page. There is also a sign of neglect among the websites that do work: of those showing a year next to the © symbol, 32 out of 111 (29%) show 2023 or earlier.
On a phone, almost all are slow.
We opened each home page simulating a phone on a slow mobile connection, and measured when the main content appears (known as LCP). Google considers anything within 2.5 seconds good. 28 websites out of 225 (12%) made it. For half of the websites it took more than 7 seconds.
| Time | Websites |
|---|---|
| Within 2.5 seconds | 12% (28 out of 225) |
| Between 2.5 and 4 seconds | 12% (26 out of 225) |
| Over 4 seconds | 76% (171 out of 225) |
By category, within 2.5 seconds: restaurants and bars 16% (13 out of 79), shops and beauty salons 11% (11 out of 102), hotels and B&Bs 9% (4 out of 44).
What it means: this is a deliberately strict lab test, but it points to a real problem. Someone looking for a place on the street, with a phone and a patchy signal, will wait only a few seconds: if the page stays blank, they go back and pick another result. Common causes are oversized photos and add-ons (the research does not measure causes).
The good news: mobile and https.
Of the 232 working websites we could analyse, 215 (93%) have the setting that fits the page to a phone screen (the “viewport” meta tag) and 216 (93%) open securely over https. Anyone typing the address without https is automatically taken to the secure version in 198 cases out of 232 (85%).
| Check | Percentage |
|---|---|
| Page fitted to phone screens (viewport) | 93% (215 out of 232) |
| Opens over https | 93% (216 out of 232) |
| Redirects automatically from http to https | 85% (198 out of 232) |
What it means: the foundations are almost always there. The issue isn’t whether the website fits a phone, but how long it takes to open and what it offers once it does.
On Google, half don’t say where.
The title is the blue headline shown in Google results. Almost every website has one (227 out of 232, 98%), but only 121 out of 232 (52%) include “Genova” or the name of a neighbourhood. A description for Google (meta description) is present on 159 websites out of 232 (69%).
| Category | Percentage |
|---|---|
| Hotels, B&Bs and hostels | 69% (34 out of 49) |
| Restaurants, bars and cafés | 57% (45 out of 79) |
| Shops and beauty salons | 40% (42 out of 104) |
| Total | 52% (121 out of 232) |
What it means: many people search for things like “pizzeria Sampierdarena” or “hairdresser Albaro”. A title that says what you do and where you are helps Google show you to people looking for exactly that. If the title only contains the business name, or the word “Home”, that opportunity is lost.
Few introduce themselves to Google and AI.
Structured data is a few lines of code, invisible to visitors, that tell search engines and AI assistants what kind of business you are, where you are and when you’re open. The type designed for businesses with a physical location, LocalBusiness or one of its subtypes such as Restaurant or Hotel, appears on only 25 websites out of 232 (11%). Meanwhile, hardly anyone shuts AI out: the robots.txt file blocks at least one of their crawlers (GPTBot, OAI-SearchBot, ChatGPT-User, PerplexityBot, ClaudeBot or Google-Extended) on 11 websites out of 263 (4%).
| Check | Percentage |
|---|---|
| Local business structured data (LocalBusiness) | 11% (25 out of 232) |
| Structured data of any kind | 59% (136 out of 232) |
| robots.txt blocking at least one AI crawler | 4% (11 out of 263) |
What it means: the door is open, but almost nobody introduces themselves. Adding correct structured data gives Google and AI clear information about opening hours, address and type of business, instead of leaving them to guess. We cover this in our guide to SEO, AEO and GEO.
Tap to call isn’t a given.
On a phone, a number written as a link can be called with one tap. 112 websites out of 232 (48%) have one. A WhatsApp link appears on 34 websites out of 232 (15%). And 113 websites out of 232 (49%) have neither.
| Category | No quick contact |
|---|---|
| Shops and beauty salons | 53% (55 out of 104) |
| Restaurants, bars and cafés | 52% (41 out of 79) |
| Hotels, B&Bs and hostels | 35% (17 out of 49) |
| Total | 49% (113 out of 232) |
What it means: anyone who wants to book a table or ask whether a product is in stock has to copy the number by hand, or look for it elsewhere. It’s one of the simplest and most useful fixes there is.
Instagram and Facebook yes, TikTok rarely.
Among the working websites, 143 out of 232 (62%) link to Facebook, 122 (53%) to Instagram and only 13 (6%) to TikTok. One website in three (85 out of 232, 37%) links to none of the three.
| Category | TikTok | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Restaurants, bars and cafés | 65% (51 out of 79) | 66% (52 out of 79) | 8% (6 out of 79) |
| Shops and beauty salons | 51% (53 out of 104) | 63% (65 out of 104) | 7% (7 out of 104) |
| Hotels, B&Bs and hostels | 37% (18 out of 49) | 53% (26 out of 49) | 0% (0 out of 49) |
Some businesses have no website at all: among the OpenStreetMap listings with a website, 8 out of 348 (2%) actually point to a social media page or to a portal such as a review or booking site.
What it means: a website and social media work best together. The website is the business’s point of reference; social media brings people in and shows the business is alive. Linking them both ways costs very little.
The menu is there, sometimes only as a PDF.
Of the 79 working restaurant, bar and café websites, 55 (70%) have a link to the menu or a menu section on the home page. The other 24 (30%) don’t. Among those that do, 10 out of 55 (18%) link to a PDF file, while 54 out of 55 (98%) also, or only, link to a web page.
| Check | Percentage |
|---|---|
| Menu on the home page (link or section) | 70% (55 out of 79) |
| Of which with a link to a PDF | 18% (10 out of 55) |
| Of which with a link to a web page (also alongside a PDF) | 98% (54 out of 55) |
What it means: the menu is one of the first things people look for. On a phone, a PDF has to be downloaded and zoomed, and every price change needs a new file; a web page or a digital menu can be read straight away and updated in moments. The differences are explained in our guide QR code menu or PDF.
How we did it.
- Sample source: OpenStreetMap, data © OpenStreetMap contributors, available under the ODbL licence. Extracted on 27 October 2026 from the area of the municipality of Genoa: restaurants, bars, cafés, pubs, fast food outlets and ice cream shops; hotels, B&Bs, hostels and holiday apartments; beauty salons, hairdressers, cosmetics stores and other shops; only where a website was listed.
- Cleaning: we removed duplicates, outlets of chains and stores with a brand listed on OpenStreetMap and addresses pointing to social media or portals, which we counted separately. That left 330 websites, all included, with no random sampling.
- What we measured: whether the website responds, https, mobile fit, time for the main content to appear, title, description, structured data, links to phone, WhatsApp and social media, menu, robots.txt, copyright year and platform. Speed was measured with Chrome simulating a phone (390×844 screen, processor slowed down 4 times, network with 150 milliseconds of delay and 1.6 Mbit/s).
- Rules: a single visit to each website’s home page, on 27 October 2026, a few at a time, with a name that says who we are and a contact address. We read the robots.txt file first: the 8 websites that asked not to be visited, or didn’t allow it to be read, were skipped. We only publish overall figures, never business names.
- The totals: of the 330 websites, 1 measurement was lost to a technical error and was not repeated; 8 were skipped because of robots.txt; 3 blocked us with an anti-bot system. That leaves 318 websites for checking whether they work. Of the 247 that work, 15 were so heavy or complex that their content could not be read: the other checks therefore cover 232 websites (225 for speed, since in 7 cases the time could not be measured). Each percentage shows its total and is rounded to the nearest whole number. Among the working websites, 137 out of 232 (59%) are built with WordPress.
The limits of this research.
- OpenStreetMap doesn’t include every business in Genoa, and some listings are out of date: some of the websites that don’t work may belong to businesses that have closed.
- We only looked at the home page: a menu or a contact on another page was not counted.
- The measurements come from a single day and a single moment.
- Speed is a lab measurement, under fixed and strict conditions: real-world times can be better or worse. Cookie banners were not closed.
- Spotting neighbourhoods in the title or a menu on the home page relies on automatic rules: a few cases may have been missed or counted by mistake.
What a business can do.
- Check that your address works and that it’s the same on Google, social media, OpenStreetMap and your business cards. Our guide Is your website working? 7 free checks helps.
- Open your website on your phone, off Wi-Fi. If it takes more than a few seconds, photos are the first thing to look at.
- Put what you do and where in the title, for example the type of place and the neighbourhood.
- Make your phone number tappable and, if you answer messages, add WhatsApp.
- Put your menu or price list on a web page that’s easy to update, not only in a PDF.
- Add local business structured data, with address, opening hours and contacts.
If your website needs rebuilding, our guide Redesign your website without losing your Google rankings explains how to do it without losing visitors. Aleryc Digital Studio is a digital agency that helps local businesses and freelancers look good online and get found. Its owner works from Genoa, and in English it works in writing, by email and WhatsApp.
How to cite this study.
You can use the figures as long as you cite the source with a link to this page:
Aleryc Digital Studio, “Genoa businesses online in 2026”, 27 October 2026, https://aleryc.com/research-genoa-businesses-online-2026
The aggregate data, with all totals by category, can be downloaded as a CSV file: aggregate data of the study (CSV). It contains no website addresses or business names. The aggregate data is published under a CC BY 4.0 licence: you can reuse it, crediting Aleryc Digital Studio. It contains information from OpenStreetMap, available under the ODbL. Questions about the method: info@aleryc.com.