All four hills are now covered by modern buildings, so they are no longer recognizable.
In the late 1990s a German archaeological team under the direction of Klaus Schmidt carried out soundings on all four hills and made extensive excavations on the second hill seen from the east.
Originally it was assumed that the four hills were settled in a specific time sequence, that one of these settlement phases would coincide with the nearby Göbekli Tepe.
The small finds correspond to what archaeologists previously knew already.
Overall, the Gürcütepe gives the impression of a rural settlement which was significantly younger than Göbekli Tepe.