Google Updates Overview
Google updates are important events for webmasters and SEOs around the world. These algorithm changes, filters, data updates, or other changes often cause a website to drop in SEO rankings or visibility. This page lists all major Google updates since 2010.
A Brief Introduction to Google Updates
Google Update, like B. Mobile Update or Ghost Update, is a term used to describe a change in the way Google's search engine rankings are calculated. Some updates break changes to the algorithm, while others may apply update filters to the database running the algorithm. The overall goal of any update is always to improve the relevancy and quality of search results, and most of the changes target one or more specific features, such as: B. Search Engine Optimization Antispam, Research or Duplicate Content Antispam.
Most updates are manually initiated and rolled out to individual Google country indexes. Some updates, such as the Penguin update or the Panda update, are already part of Google's core algorithm. They have been integrated into the browser in such a way that they now grow continuously and automatically and are no longer updated manually.
Every year, Google makes more than 600 tweaks and updates to its algorithms. Most of these changes go unnoticed and are not advertised in the search engine industry.
Google's biggest updates happen when changes are made to the structure and functionality of the algorithm. They have more impact than updating the data, which does not add new functionality to the underlying algorithm, but simply updates the data the algorithm uses.
Google updates since 2010
The table lists all of Google's major updates since 2010. They are listed in chronological order, starting with the most recent (as of June 2017).
| update names | Date of first use | Characteristics | Verified by Google |
| Google Product Reviews Update December 2021 | Dec 1, 2021 | On December 1, Google announced that the Product Ratings Update will be released in December 2021. » Google Product Reviews Update December 2021 | Yes |
| Important Google Update November 2021 | November 17, 2021 | On November 17, 2021, Google announced a major major update. According to Google, the rollout was completed on November 30. » Important Google Update November 2021 | Yes |
| Google Important Update June/July 2021 | July 1, 2021 | The rollout of Google's June/July 2021 Major Update Part 2 began on July 1, 2021 and ended on July 12. » Important Google Update June/July 2021 | Yes |
| Google Page Features Update | June 15, 2021 | The release of the Page Experience update and the introduction of the new Core Web Vitals user experience metrics began on June 15, 2021 and will be two and a half months before the end of August 2021, according to Google. » Updated site interface and key web vitality | Yes |
| Google Important Update June/July 2021 | June 2, 2021 | Google has announced a summer update, which consists of two parts. After the June update, we may see thin content or YMYL losers. Some of the winning sites are old sites and some have been lost in the past after the December or November 2020 updates. » Important Google Update June 2021 | Yes |
| Important Google Update December 2020 | Dec 3, 2020 | Google announces its third major update for 2020 and we see significant ranking changes in typical areas related to EAT and music, health, news and ecommerce content. » Important Google Update December 2020 | Yes |
| Major update from Google May 2020 | May 4, 2020 | Amid the coronavirus pandemic, Google is announcing its second core update of 2020, and the changes that come with this core update appear to affect many industries, from regulations to healthcare to finance. » Important update from Google, May 2020 | Yes |
| Google Update February 2020 | February 7, 2020 | On February 7 and 8, 2020, major changes were observed in Google's search results. This update has not been confirmed by Google as a core update, although Google is simply reiterating its statement that algorithm updates are underway. » Google Update February 2020 | Yes and no |
| Big Google Update January 2020 | January 13, 2020 | The first official kernel update of 2020 was released on January 13, 2020. There is no information about its effects yet. With this update, Google continues its communication strategy of announcing important updates on Twitter. » Google Update January 2020 | Yes |
| Google Update November 2019 | Nov 7, 2019 | In the United States, webmasters operating affiliate websites have witnessed major changes in the travel, food, and healthcare industries. Google did not comment on the changes, but SEO experts described the update as aggressive. » Google Update November 2019 | Yes |
| Google BERT update | October 24, 2019 | This is Google's biggest algorithm change in the past five years, affecting one in ten searches. With the Google BERT update, Google wants to improve the interpretation of complex searches and show more relevant search results. » Google BERT update | Yes |
| September 2019 Google Core Update | September 24, 2019 | The September 2019 Core Update has been released worldwide since September 24. This Google update aims to improve the quality of content in search results. For the second time, Google has previously announced an update to its core algorithm. » Important Google Update September 2019 | Yes |
| Updated Google Rich Snippet validation. | September 18, 2019 | The star ratings of websites that Google previously showed in the SERP have been significantly reduced. With the update, rankings will no longer appear in search results if they are generated by websites themselves. Google called this self-service markup, which has no value for users. | Yes |
| Important Google Update June 2019 | June 3, 2019 | Google set a new precedent in its June 2019 core update by announcing major changes to the core algorithm early for the first time in Google's update history. This update was the second major update of 2019 to change the core algorithm and was released on June 3rd as announced. » Important Google Update June 2019 | Yes |
| Google March 2019 major update | March 12, 2019 | In this update to the global core algorithm, the rankings for keywords related to health and other sensitive topics have changed. The algorithm has also been modified to reward trust and experience and user signals. » Important update from Google, March 2019 | Yes |
| Google Halloween Update | From November 2018 | Fluctuations in the SERPs as of early November 2018 indicate an unofficial quality update. The timing of this update led to the name "Halloween Update", although Google has not officially confirmed this. | new |
| EAT update #2 | From October 2018 | This EAT update setting caused the health pages that benefited from the first EAT update to lose their visibility. Likewise, some sites that were negatively impacted by the first EAT update have been brought back. | new |
| Google Anniversary Update | September 2018 | An unofficial update from Google that affects many of the domains previously affected by the August 2018 EAT update, often in reverse. | new |
| EAT update | August 2018 | An official update from Google that rewards ExpertiseAuthorityTrust websites, especially for YMYL (Your Money or Your Life) keywords. » Google EAT update | Yes |
| mobile speed update | July 2018 | As of July 9, 2018, website load time is Google's official mobile search ranking signal. According to Google, the quick update will only affect sites that offer the slowest user experience. » Google Refresh Rate Analysis | Yes |
| automated video carousels | June 2018 | Google has started showing video carousels for desktop searches. At the same time, many organic video rankings disappeared. This has led to fluctuations in the visibility of websites with a lot of video content, such as YouTube or Vimeo. | new |
| Expand MobileFirstIndex | March 26, 2018 | After a year and a half of preparation, Google announced that it will use the mobile version of websites for the first time to build its Google index. This move to mobile indexing will initially only affect a few sites and Google has not disclosed how long the implementation is expected to take or when it will be completed. » Provide an index of MobileFirst | Yes |
| Core Algorithm Update | March 12, 2018 | In November 2017, many webmasters suspected that a Google update had taken place. These suspicions were confirmed by the official kernel update, which was released on March 12, 2018 and caused huge swings in search results. The winning sites saw another boost in the fall of 2017, while the losing sites fell again. » Basic Algorithm Analysis | Yes |
| Update clip length | November 30, 2017 | In this update, Google has increased the length of the meta descriptions that appear for many search results. The maximum length was 155 characters with the update, this has (almost) doubled to 300. | Yes |
| Update user location | October 27, 2017 | As of October 2017, users will receive search results based on their current physical location, regardless of their primary domain (for example, when they type in the address bar). » Location update analysis | Yes |
| Chrome HTTPS Warning | October 17, 2017 | The release of Chrome 62 also displays a warning for sites that request user information but do not properly or fully use HTTPS encryption. | Yes |
| Update dictionary | June 25, 2017 | In June 2017, an update made (further) visibility improvements for dictionary domains. Dictionary URLs have improved their ranking, especially for short keywords that may have different user intent. » Dictionary update analysis | new |
| Update Fred | March 3, 2017 | The update has not been officially confirmed by Google. The name comes from Gary Illis, who joked that all updates would be called Fred from now on. Sites with low-quality content that have no real value to users suffer the most. The update is believed to target overuse of banner ads, meaning it could be seen as a repeat of the so-called interstitial penalty. | Yes and no |
| Ghost V Update | February 2017 | The heavy impact on the rating indicated that tweaks had been made to the Phantom update again. The update has not been confirmed by Google. However, the final model showed that it was a ghost. » Analysis of the Phantom V | new |
| temporary fine | January 10, 2017 | This update should primarily target sites that aggressively use interstitials and popups because of their negative impact on the user experience. | Yes |
| Penguin 4.0 Update | September 27, 2016 - October 6, 2016 | This major update to the Penguin algorithm was done in stages and took approximately two weeks to complete. In the second phase, websites were given the option to bypass the Penguin filter and restore rankings by removing fines. » Penguin Analysis 4.0 | Yes |
| mobile update 2 | May 12, 2016 | This update gives more weight to mobile-optimized websites when ranking in Google's mobile search results. Websites that were not optimized for smartphones at the time of the first mobile update were able to regain lost positions in mobile search results. » Mobilegeddon 2 review | Yes |
| Phantom Upgrade IV | May 10, 2016 | The pattern of this unconfirmed update was similar to previous Ghost updates and affected traffic on several of the same websites. Therefore, it is believed that this was the fourth iteration of the modification of this algorithm. » Phantom IV Analysis | new |
| Google core update | January 2016 | Pages with consistent, high-quality content are big winners for many keywords. But not only the amount of content was decisive for the ranking. Rather, it was about whether the content corresponds to the intent of the user. » Analysis of the most important Google updates | Yes |
| Ghost Update III | Dec 2015 | Since the change in Google's Quality Score guidelines, webmasters and SEOs around the world have noticed a change in their rankings. Various analyzes showed that the update was mainly about the user intent and the quality of the content. » Mind Analysis III | |
| RankBrain | October 26, 2015 | RankBrain is a machine learning system primarily designed to handle searches that Google is not yet familiar with. Every day, more than 15% of user searches are new to Google. » RankBrain Analysis | Yes |
| Panda Update #28 (Panda 4.2) | Mid July 2015 | The latest Google Panda came out ten months after the last and it again focused on content quality, redundant and irrelevant content, and spam. However, due to the long lead times (about 8 weeks) of (near) simultaneous updates and algorithm changes, webmasters didn't always know which updates were impacting their traffic. » Panda Analysis 4.2 | new |
| News wave update | Mid June 2015 | This update, which has not been confirmed by Google, mainly affected searches for trending and informational keywords. Media websites have benefited the most from this launch. » News ripple analysis | new |
| Phantom Update II (aka Quality Update) | May 2015 | While Google has confirmed that it is making changes to its website's quality ranking signals, no further details have been provided. For this reason, this update was called Phantom. This second version of the Ghost update (after the first in May 2013) caused huge fluctuations in search results and caused some websites to lose half of their traffic. The impact of this algorithm update was felt all over the world. » Mind Analysis 2 | Yes and no |
| Mobile update (#Mobilegeddon) | Apr 22, 2015 | Google used this update to make website usability a ranking factor in mobile search. This was the first update that Google explicitly announced ahead of launch. »Mobilgeddon Review | Yes |
| Ecommerce/Brand Update | February 2015 | The possible update to the Google algorithm has caused a stir on the brand's website and in the rankings of online stores. The update targeted keywords with high search volume. » Analysis of e-commerce updates | new |
| Pirate Version Update 2 (DMCS Penalty) | October 21, 2014 | This is an improvement over the Pirates update. Above all, copyright infringements need to be better recognized and punished. Google has confirmed this iteration. » Hacker Analysis 2 | Yes |
| penguin 3 | October 2014 | Google announced a new Penguin update, but the changes brought about by the latest update weren't apparent and it looked like they weren't going to happen right away. Overall, less than 1% of searches were impacted within a few weeks, so this penguin's impact on website traffic is much less than other iterations. | Yes |
| Panda Update #27 (Panda 4.1) | September 23, 2014 | Pages without content were especially affected. Google said the update affected up to 5% of all searches. » Panda Analysis 4.1 | Yes |
| HTTPS/SSL update | August 6, 2014 | With this update, HTTPS encryption has become a ranking signal. For Google, this update is an important step towards greater security when using websites around the world. It was not immediately clear how much this would affect the rankings. » Check for HTTPS updates | Yes |
| Panda Update #26 Panda 4.0 | May 19, 2014 | The Google Panda update affected 7.5% of searches in English. The fourth generation of this algorithm has again adapted the quality requirements of websites. » Panda Analysis 4.0 | Yes |
| Payday Loan Algorithm Update 2.0 | About May 16, 2014 | This update improved Google's ability to filter pages containing unwanted search terms from search results. This should significantly improve the user experience for people who search on Google. At the same time, it became more difficult for high spam density domains to rank well. | Yes |
| Layout update version 3 (ads in the top half of the page) | February 6, 2014 | With this update, Google cracked websites with too many ads at the top of the page. Such ads make for a very bad user experience, which is why Google has penalized the affected websites. | new |
| Penguin Update 2.1 | October 4, 2013 | Modified the Penguin update, which had a moderate impact on search results. The first iteration of the second generation streamlined what was already known and didn't cause too much chaos in the SERPs. | Yes |
| hummingbird update | August 20, 2013 | The Hummingbird update improved semantic search and expanded the Google Knowledge Network. Since Hummingbird, Google has been able to recognize relationships between search terms. This update can be seen as the predecessor of RankBrain. » Hummingbird Analysis | Yes |
| Update Panda "Recovery | July 18, 2013 | For example, this update reduced the impact of previous Panda updates. Cancellation of previously imposed fines. This panda was not included in the update numbering. | Yes |
| payday loan algorithm | 11 June 2013 | This update from Google targets niche sites that are often attacked by sophisticated, similar, or trustworthy sites. The update was announced on 06/11/2013. | Yes |
| Update Penguin 2.0 | May 22, 2013 | The algorithm in this update has been significantly redesigned and improved to fight link spam. » Penguin Review 2.0 | Yes |
| mind i | may 2013 | The first release of what would become the Ghost Update. Google has not confirmed the exact nature of the algorithm change, but the industry has certainly felt its impact along with subsequent updates to Ghost. | new |
| Panda Update #25 | March 14, 2013 | This was probably the last Panda update before this algorithm was integrated into Google's main algorithm. | Yes |
| Panda Update #24 | January 22, 2013 | According to Google, this update hit about 1.2% of all searches. | Yes |
| Panda Update #23 | December 21, 2012 | This data update impacted 1.3% of searches in English. | Yes |
| Panda Update #22 and Pony Update | Nov 21, 2012 | This update, which was confirmed by Google, appears to have been a data update. However, this has led to a significant drop in ranking for many websites. » Pony Analysis | Yes |
| Panda Update #21 | Nov 5, 2012 | This update affected 1.1% of searches in English. | Yes |
| Design Update #2 (Ads at the top of the page) | October 9, 2012 | Google has confirmed this update, but it's unclear if it was just a data update or something . | Yes |
| Penguin update 1.2 | October 5, 2012 | This Penguin update affected only 0.3% of all searches. | Yes |
| Panda Update #20 and EMD Update (Exact Domain Match Update) | September 27, 2012 | The EMD update has greatly reduced the importance of exact match domains. Since then, the relevance of key domains is no longer as high as it used to be. Along with the Panda update being rolled out at the same time, this resulted in a noticeable change in search results. | Yes |
| Panda Update #19 | September 18, 2012 | As with the update four weeks earlier, this data update had a limited impact on search results. | Yes |
| Panda Update #18 | August 20, 2012 | This Panda Update database update had minimal impact. | Yes |
| update (DMCA penalty) | August 10, 2012 | Since this update, sites have been fined for copyright infringement and, for example, offering content. The affected websites were previously reported to Google via so-called DMCA takedown requests. | Yes |
| Panda Update #17 | July 24, 2012 | This data update caused several days of movement in the SERPs. According to Google, about 1% of search results were affected. | Yes |
| Panda Update #16 | June 25, 2012 | This data update had a limited impact on the SERPs. | Yes |
| Panda Update #15 | June 8, 2012 | This Panda update affected about 1% of all searches. | Yes |
| penguin 1.1 | 26 May 12 | This update was a data update to the Penguin algorithm and Matt Cutts stated that very few searches were affected ( Literal Meanings of Google Updates OverviewUpdates:Meanings of Updates:
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