Many Hong Kong SME websites serve more than local searchers: overseas Chinese customers, travellers, or markets such as Macao, Singapore and Taiwan. Until recently, Search Console’s Performance (Search results) report let you pick only one country or one device at a time in those filters. To see several markets together you had to use Compare (two items max) or export and add the numbers yourself. On 6 October 2026, Google Search Central announced an update that makes multi-country and multi-device combined views easier.
What Google changed
According to the official Search Console help page on advanced filtering and comparison, and Search Engine Journal’s report of Google Search Central’s LinkedIn announcement (6 October 2026):
- On the Filter tab, you can select multiple countries and see their combined clicks, impressions, average CTR and average position.
- You can likewise select multiple devices (for example mobile plus tablet) and see combined device data.
- Compare remains available: place up to two countries, devices, Search types or Search appearances side by side, with a Difference column.
- You still cannot filter by multiple Search appearances at once.
In short: Filter adds selected items into one combined view; Compare puts two items side by side. Use them for different questions.
How to apply a multi-country or multi-device filter
- Open Google Search Console and select your property.
- Go to Performance → Search results.
- In the filter row, click Add filter, or open an existing Country or Device filter.
- Choose Country or Device, stay on the Filter tab, tick the items to combine, then apply.
- Queries, Pages, Dates and other tabs follow that combined filter; you can still stack Search type, query or page conditions.
If checkboxes for multiple items are not visible yet, the change may still be rolling out to your property. Check again in a few days. Treat Google’s help centre as the source of truth for how the UI works.
Practical uses for Hong Kong SMEs
- Hong Kong plus real overseas markets: tick Hong Kong and regions where you already get enquiries, then read overall Search performance without switching country by country.
- Mobile plus tablet: local service businesses often live on phones; combine non-desktop devices for a “handheld” view, then Compare against desktop.
- Bilingual site checks: after fixing a country filter, use Pages or Queries to see which Chinese or English URLs work better in which markets, so you prioritise edits instead of rewriting the whole site.
- Campaign windows: combine a multi-country Filter with a date comparison to see whether a market group moved together around a promotion.
Limits before you draw conclusions
- Country is where the searcher was at query time, not a “target country” setting on your page. A visitor searching from abroad counts under that country.
- Average position in a combined view is impression-weighted; a high-volume country dominates the average. Be careful when comparing groups of very different sizes.
- Tables still have row limits, and some queries are anonymised and missing from detail rows; filtering by query or page can still make totals and details diverge, as before.
- Compare is still capped at two items, with one comparison active at a time. To contrast two periods for a country group, use date comparison on top of a multi-country Filter.
This does not guarantee rankings
The update improves how you inspect traffic by country and device. It does not by itself change how your site ranks in Google Search. Visibility still depends on clear service and coverage copy, readable mobile pages, a clean Search Console crawl/index picture, and compliance with Google’s spam policies. When numbers drop, first ask whether the change is one country, one device, or the whole property—multi-item filters help narrow that down.
Short next-step checklist
- Confirm the site is verified in Search Console and open Performance → Search results regularly.
- On Filter, tick Hong Kong plus one or two overseas markets you actually serve; note the top queries and landing pages.
- Use Compare for mobile versus desktop and spot service pages with weak mobile CTR or position.
- Turn findings into content or layout fixes (service area, contact paths, mobile headings)—not only into another chart.