What are Google Algorithms?
Google’s algorithms
are a complex system used to retrieve data from its search index and instantly
deliver the best possible results for a query. The search engine uses a
combination of algorithms and numerous ranking factors to deliver webpages
ranked by relevance on its search engine results pages (SERPs).
In its early years,
Google only made a handful of updates to its algorithms. Now, Google makes
thousands of changes every year.
Most of these updates
are so slight that they go completely unnoticed. However, on occasion, the
search engine rolls out major algorithmic updates that significantly impact the
SERPs such as:
·
Fred
·
Intrusive Interstitials Update
·
Panda
·
Penguin
·
Pigeon
·
Payday
Below we have compiled
a full list of Google algorithm launches, updates, and refreshes that have
rolled out over the years, as well as links to resources for SEO professionals
who want to understand each of these changes.
Choose a Year
All Updates
July 26, 2021
Google
Link Spam Algorithm Update
Google announced an
algorithm update aimed at identifying and nullifying link spam was beginning to
roll out. Google warned that any sites taking part in link spam tactics could
see ranking changes – with sponsored, guest, and affiliate content most likely
to be impacted. Google said the update should be fully rolled out in “at least”
two weeks and will impact multiple languages.
Read: Google Link Spam Algorithm Update Rolling Out on July 26
July 12, 2021
July
2021 Core Update Completed
Google Search Liaison
confirmed via Twitter that the
July 2021 Core Update rollout was effectively completed on July 12th. No
additional details were provided.
Read: Google July 2021 Update is Over – What Happened?
July 1, 2021
July
2021 Core Update
Google Search Liaison
announced via Twitter the July
2021 Core Update is rolling out and will take one to two weeks to complete.
Google’s guidance for core
updates can be found on the Google Search Central Blog.
Read: Google July 2021 Core Update Begins Rolling Out
June 28, 2021
Spam
Update Part 2
Google Search Liaison
announced via Twitter that the
second part of their spam update has begun on June 28th and will likely be
completed on the same day. The original announcement referred to a post on the Google
Search Central Blog, updated in April 2021, on how Google fought Search spam in
2020.
Read: Google Announces Spam Update Part 2
June 23, 2021
June
2021 Spam Update
Google’s Danny
Sullivan announced via
Twitter an algorithm update targeted at fighting spam was rolling out to search
results. The rollout of the update was to be completed the same day. He added
that a second spam update would follow within a week. Google revealed no
specific details on what this update was targeting.
Read: Google Rolls Out New Spam Algorithm Update
June 15, 2021
Page
Experience Update
Google confirms its
long-awaited Page Experience update has started rolling out. Sites should not
expect to see drastic changes as a result of this update, Google says, and any
sudden drops or spikes should be mitigated by the gradual rollout process. The
rollout will be completed by the end of August 2021.
Read: Google Page Experience Update Begins Rolling Out
June 10, 2021
Known
Victims Protection
On June 10, Pandu
Nayak,
Google Fellow and Vice President of Search, published a post on The Keyword
blog. In it, he discussed Google’s work towards improving the algorithm to
demote sites that “employ exploitative removals practices” and “predatory
practices.” He also shared a link people can use
to report online harassment.
Read: Google Algorithm Update Targets Slander
June 2, 2021
Broad
Core Algorithm Update
Google Search Liaison
Danny Sullivan announced via
Twitter that a broad core algorithm update was about to be released. Sullivan
also noted that some planned improvements weren’t quite ready for this update,
so the parts that weren’t ready will be rolled out as part of second, related
broad core algorithm update, scheduled for July.
Read: Google Broad Core Algorithm Update Rolling Out June 2,
2021
April 8, 2021
Product
Reviews Update
This
new search ranking algorithm update was designed to reward “product reviews
that share in-depth research, rather than thin content that simply summarizes a
bunch of products.” In their announcement, Google also shared nine useful
questions to consider when creating and publishing product reviews.
Read: Google Product Reviews Update Goes Live in Search Results
Read: Google’s Product Reviews Algorithm Update: Winners &
Losers
February 10, 2021
Passage
Ranking
Google’s Public
Liaison for Search, Danny Sullivan, announced via
Twitter that Passage Ranking officially launched for English-language queries
in the United States. According to Google: “This change doesn’t mean we’re
indexing individual passages independently of pages. We’re still indexing pages
and considering info about entire pages for ranking. But now we can also
consider passages from pages as an additional ranking factor….”
Read: What Is Google Passage Ranking: 16 Key Points You Should
Know
December 3, 2020
December
2020 Core Update
Google confirms a core
algorithm update, the December 2020 Core Update, is rolled out on December 3,
2020. This is the third core algorithm update of the calendar year. A fair
amount of time has passed since the last core update, compared to the average
time between these types of updates.
Read more about this
update below.
Read: What Is a Google Broad Core Algorithm Update?
Read: Google on Broad Core Algorithm Update Recovery – 4
Takeaways
Read: Recovering from a Google Core Algorithm Update with Lily
Ray [PODCAST]
Read: Google Confirms Rollout of Core Algorithm Update
Read: Google December 2020 Core Update Insights
May 4, 2020
May
2020 Core Update
Google Search Liaison
Danny Sullivan announced via Twitter that
Google would be releasing a broad core algorithm update. About 90 minutes
later, he announced the
update was underway and would take 1-2 weeks to completely roll out.
Read: Google Confirms May 2020 Core Algorithm Update Rolling
Out Today
January 22, 2020
Featured
Snippet Deduplication
Google’s Danny
Sullivan confirmed via
Twitter that webpages in a featured snippet position will no longer be repeated
in regular Page 1 organic listings. This change affected 100% of all search
listings, worldwide.
Read: Google: Webpages with Featured Snippets Won’t Appear
Twice on Page 1
Read: Google Offers Guidance on Featured Snippets Update
Read: Google’s Featured Snippet Changes & Impact on Organic
Traffic [STUDY]
Read: Unpacking the CausalImpact of Google’s Double-Dipping
Featured Snippet Update
January 13, 2020
January
2020 Core Update
Google’s Danny
Sullivan announced via a tweet that a broad
core algorithm update was about to be released. Google again provided the same
guidance as for all other recent broad core algorithm updates.
Read: Google January 2020 Core Update is Rolling Out Imminently
December 9, 2019
BERT
(Worldwide)
Google’s Danny
Sullivan tweeted that BERT
was beginning its worldwide rollout, and included the following languages:
Afrikaans, Albanian, Amharic, Arabic, Armenian, Azeri, Basque, Belarusian,
Bulgarian, Catalan, Chinese (Simplified & Taiwan), Croatian, Czech, Danish,
Dutch, English, Estonian, Farsi, Finnish, French, Galician, Georgian, German,
Greek, Gujarati, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Icelandic, Indonesian, Italian,
Japanese, Javanese, Kannada, Kazakh, Khmer, Korean, Kurdish, Kyrgyz, Lao,
Latvian, Lithuanian, Macedonian Malay (Brunei Darussalam & Malaysia),
Malayalam, Maltese, Marathi, Mongolian, Nepali, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese,
Punjabi, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Sinhalese, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish,
Swahili, Swedish, Tagalog, Tajik, Tamil, Telugu, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian,
Urdu, Uzbek, and Vietnamese.
Read: Google’s BERT Rolls Out Worldwide
October 25, 2019
BERT
Update
Google announced the BERT
Update, calling it the biggest change to Google search in the past 5 years.
Google uses BERT models to better understand search queries. Google said this
change impacted both search rankings and featured snippets and BERT (which
stands for Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers) will be
used on 10 percent of U.S. English searches.
Read: Google Applies New BERT Model to Search Rankings,
Affecting 1-in-10 Queries
Read: Google BERT Update – What it Means
Read: Google BERT Misinformation Challenged
September 24, 2019
Broad
Core Algorithm Update
Google’s Danny
Sullivan announced via a tweet that a broad
core algorithm update would be released within a few hours and it would take a
few days to complete rolling out. Google’s guidance was the same as it had been
for all other recent core algorithm updates.
Read: Google is Releasing a Broad Core Algorithm Update Today,
September 24th
Read: September 2019 Google Update – Winners and Losers
June 2, 2019
June
2019 Core Update
On June 2, Google
Search Liaison Danny Sullivan tweeted that Google
would be releasing a new broad core algorithm update on June 3.
The next day, Google confirmed the
update was live and would be rolling out to its various data centers over the
coming days. As is the case with any broad core algorithm update, Google tells
us there is nothing specific to fix because a core update encompasses a broad
range of factors.
Read: Google Announces June 2019 Broad Core Algorithm Update
Read: June 2019 Broad Core Algo Update: It’s More than E-A-T
Read: Google Broad Core Updates And Why Some Health Sites
Affected
Read: Google’s John Mueller Discusses June 2019 Update Recovery
Read: Google Publishes Core Algorithm Update Guidance
March 12, 2019
March
2019 Core Update (a.k.a. Florida 2)
Google’s Search
Liaison Danny Sullivan confirmed via Twitter the
release of a global broad core algorithm update. SEJ confirmed this update is
particularly important and one of the biggest Google updates in years. Sullivan
once again recommended following the guidance it provided following the March 9, 2018 update.
Read: Google Update Florida 2: March 2019 Core Update Is a Big
One
Read: March 2019 Core Update: What’s Changed? Early Insights
& Reaction
Read: Data Confirms Why Google March 2019 Update Feels Like a
Rollback
February 13, 2019
Valentine’s
Day Update
Algorithm trackers and
industry chatter indicated some sort of unconfirmed update took place on and
before this date. However, unlike other updates, mostly positive changes in
rankings were being reported.
Read: Evidence of Google Valentine’s Day Algorithm Update
October 31, 2018
Unconfirmed
Halloween Update
Some webmasters
reported changes starting around Halloween, perhaps indicating an (unconfirmed)
Google update. But there was little evidence of a significant update here. The
more likely cause of the chatter was spillover from the August broad core algorithm update and
Google ramping up its use of neural matching.
Read: Worried About Unconfirmed Halloween Google Algorithm
Update?
September 27, 2018
A
"Small" Update
On September 27 (Google’s 20th birthday), many within the SEO
community began noticing significant spikes and drops in traffic, indicating
some sort of update was underway. Some of the sites impacted by the August broad core algorithm update reportedly
made a recovery. Google’s Search Liaison Danny Sullivan confirmed via Twitter September
29 that some sort of “smaller” update had taken place (but it wasn’t a broad
core algorithm update).
Read: Google Confirms An Algorithm Update Occurred September 27
Read: Google Clarifies a Few Things About Recent Search
Algorithm Updates
August 1, 2018
Broad
Core Algorithm Update
Google confirmed via Twitter for the
third time this year the rollout of a broad core algorithm update. In doing so,
Google’s Search Liaison Danny Sullivan recommended following the guidance it
provided following the March 9, 2018 update. This update has been
referred to as “Medic” by some in the industry, even though Google said it was
a general ranking update and wasn’t
specifically targeting medical sites.
Read: Google Confirms Broad Core Algorithm Update: The Facts
& Advice
Read: Google Says Raters Guidelines is Key to Broad Core Update
Read: Google Offers More Algo Update Details
Read: Social Media Signals and August Core Algo Update
Read: Google: Make Content More Relevant to Recover from August
Algorithm Update
Read: Googler on How to Recover from Medic Update
April 16, 2018
Broad
Core Algorithm Update
Google confirmed via Twitter the
release of another broad core algorithm update, and indicated it was similar to
the March 9, 2018 update, which was about content relevance.
Read: Google Confirms Algorithm Update Released on April 16th
March 9, 2018
Broad
Core Algorithm Update
On March 12, Google
confirmed via Twitter that a
“broad core algorithm update” had rolled out the prior week. While Google
was light on details, Google said the changes were meant to “benefit pages that
were previously under-rewarded,” and advised everyone to “continue building
great content.”
Read: Google Confirms Algorithm Update Occurred Last Week
Read: Google’s Broad Core Algorithm Update Examined
Read: Google Confirms March Algorithm Update Was About
Relevance, Not Quality
Read: What Is a Google Broad Core Algorithm Update?
December 12, 2017
Maccabees
Update
Some in the search
community reported their websites being hit by update between December 12 and
14. Google confirmed several minor changes to the core algorithm during the
timeframe, but downplayed the significance of the period of flux.
Read: Maccabees Update: Google Confirms New Core Algorithm
Changes
September 8, 2017
Fall
Flux
Industry chatter and
SEO tracking tools indicated some sort of (still unconfirmed) Google update may
have occurred on this date. Glenn Gabe, president of G-Squared
Interactive, also detected several noteworthy Google changes impacting traffic
and search visibility starting September 8. This was followed by additional
volatility and fluctuations on September 18, 25, and 29, as well as October 4,
8, and 12.
Read: Exploring The Wild Google Algorithm Updates and
Volatility In The Fall of 2017 (Glenn Gabe)
August 19, 2017
Quality
Update
Webmasters and SEO
ranking tools detected some minor volatility on August 19-20, with signs indicating
this may have been another (unconfirmed) Google quality update. Among the
ranking casualties: category pages, pages with aggressive advertising,
lower-quality/thin content, and other negative user experience elements,
according to an analysis by Glenn Gabe, president of GSQi. There was some
speculation that Google began testing this algorithm on August 14 because pages
that were impacted (either positively or negatively) on this date were further
impacted on August 19.
Read: Google Algorithm & Ranking Update Chatter (Search
Engine Roundtable)
July 9, 2017
Quality
Update
SEO ranking tools
detected some minor volatility on July 9, potentially another (unconfirmed)
Google quality update.
Read: Signs Of A Google Search Algorithm Update Over Weekend
(Search Engine Roundtable)
June 25, 2017
June
25 Update
Various SEO tracking
tools detected a significant, though unconfirmed, Google update on this date.
One analysis found that this update caused the biggest fluctuations for pages
ranking in Positions 6-10. While it impacted most niches, the good and beverage
industry was reportedly impacted the most.
Read: A Significant Google Algorithm Update Likely Occurred on
June 25
Read: The June 25 Google Update: What You Should Do Now
May 17, 2017
Quality
Update
Starting May 17 and
lasting for about a week, SEO tracking tools reported lots of SERP volatility.
While the impact seems limited, those sites impacted by this update tended to
have issues with aggressive/deceptive advertising, UX issues, and
thin/low-quality content.
Read: Google Search Ranking & Algorithm Shifts Still
Underway
March 7, 2017
Fred
Google’s Gary Illyes
jokingly referred to this update as “Fred” and the name ended up sticking.
But this algorithm was no laughing matter for those impacted. This major
algorithm update seemed to mainly target low-value content. On March 24, Illyes
officially confirmed the update. But Google has refused to share any more
specifics, instead choosing to say that all the answers about Fred can be found
in Google’s Webmaster Quality Guidelines.
Read: Everything You Need to Know About the Google ‘Fred’
Update
Read: Google's John Mueller: "We Make Changes Almost Every
Day"
Read: 3 Examples of Impact From the March 7, 2017 Google
Algorithm Update (AKA Fred) (GSQi)
February 7, 2017
February
7 Update
This unconfirmed major
update resulted in massive rankings shifts in Google’s SERPs, which also meant
major increases or decreases for some websites. Overall, it seems
higher-quality and more relevant websites gained the most visibility.
Read: Google Search Algorithm Update February 7th
February 1, 2017
February
1 Update
This was a minor and
unconfirmed Google update. Although all information about this update is more
speculation than fact, it seemed to target private blog networks or those doing
spammy link building.
Read: Unconfirmed Google algorithm update may be better at
discounting links and spam
January 10, 2017
Intrusive
Interstitials Update
On August 23, 2016,
Google announced an upcoming change that would target intrusive interstitials
and pop-ups that hurt the search experience on mobile devices. As promised,
this update rolled out January 10, 2017. The impact of this update on
rankings was minimal.
Read: Google to Devalue Pages With Intrusive Pop-Ups in Mobile
Search
Read: 51% Haven’t Felt the Effects of Google’s Mobile
Interstitials Penalty [POLL]
Read: 7 Tips for Using Pop-ups Without Harming Your SEO
November 10, 2016
Unnamed
Update
Search industry
chatter and data from SEO tracking tools indicated some sort of unconfirmed
Google update happened on November 10.
Read: A Google Search Update Appears to Have Occurred on
November 10th [DATA]
September 23, 2016
Penguin
Update 4.0 & Core Algorithm Integration
The final update to
the Penguin algorithm saw it integrated into Google’s core algorithm, meaning
Penguin was now evaluating websites and links in real-time. Another big change
was Penguin devalued links, rather than downgrading the rankings of pages.
Read: A Complete Guide to the Google Penguin Algorithm Update
Read: Penguin is Now a Real-Time Component of Google’s Core
Algorithm
June 1, 2016
Quality
Update
Though unconfirmed by
Google, data indicates that another content-related Quality Update to Google’s
algorithm began rolling out around June 1, with additional search ranking
volatility seen on June 8, 21, and 26.
Read: The Phantom Returns: All About Google’s Quality Updates
Read: Data Suggests A Google Algorithm Update Occurred in June
2016
Read: News Sites Benefitting From June’s Google Quality Update
[STUDY]
May 12, 2016
Mobile-Friendly
Update (#2)
The second
Mobile-Friendly Update (or “Mobilegeddon 2”) was an update to Google’s first
mobile-friendly update, meant to “increases the effect of the ranking signal.”
Read: Mobilegeddon: A Complete Guide to Google’s
Mobile-Friendly Update
January 11, 2016
Panda
Core Algorithm Incorporation
Google confirmed
that Panda had been incorporated into the core Google algorithm, evidently
as part of the slow Panda 4.2 rollout. In other words, Panda was no longer a
filter applied to the Google algorithm after it does its work, but is
incorporated as another of its core ranking signals. It has been clarified,
however, that this doesn’t mean the Panda classifier acts in real time.
Read: A Complete Guide to the Google Panda Update
Read: Google’s Panda Now Part of Its Core Ranking Algorithm
Comments