Google algorithm update history records changes to its ranking systems. This page lists confirmed ranking updates from 2023 to 26 October 2026 using Google’s dashboard, then keeps a historical archive with a source-checked 2017 to 2019 timeline. The older archive also includes search features, infrastructure changes and industry observations, labelled where the evidence differs. Google does not announce every change, so no public history can list them all.
The short answer
Google confirms several ranking updates every year, mostly broad core updates and spam updates. In 2026 so far it has confirmed two core updates (March and May) and four spam updates. Core updates reassess how helpful and trustworthy content is across the whole web. Spam updates target manipulative tactics such as scaled content, expired domain abuse and link schemes. If your traffic drops, line the dates up with Google’s Search Status Dashboard before you change anything.
I use an update history as a timeline, not a diagnosis. My team’s WPO work starts with the site’s data: which pages and queries changed, what was released and whether tracking still works. An update landing near a traffic drop is a reason to investigate. It is not proof that Google caused it.
What is a Google algorithm update?
A Google algorithm update is a change to the systems Google uses to rank search results. Google makes thousands of small changes every year without announcing them. It confirms the larger ones, such as core updates and spam updates, on its Search Status Dashboard, with a start date and how long the rollout took.
There are three kinds you will hear about most:
- Core updates: broad changes to how Google assesses content across all sites. They can move rankings up or down without any penalty involved.
- Spam updates: improvements to SpamBrain and other systems that detect sites breaking Google’s spam policies.
- Targeted updates: changes aimed at one type of content, such as reviews or Discover, or one system, such as helpful content before it was folded into core ranking in 2024.
Which Google algorithm updates happened in 2023 to 2026?
Google confirmed 7 ranking updates in 2026 up to 26 October, 4 in 2025, 7 in 2024 and 9 in 2023. Rollout times vary substantially: the March 2024 core update took 45 days, while some spam updates took less than a day. Every date below comes from Google’s Search Status Dashboard. Use the recorded interval rather than assuming every update follows the same schedule.
| Update | Started | Rollout time | Type |
|---|---|---|---|
| September 2026 spam update | 24 Sep 2026 | 13 days, 16 hours | Spam |
| August 2026 spam update | 18 Aug 2026 | 2 days, 16 hours | Spam |
| June 2026 spam update | 24 Jun 2026 | 2 days, 1 hour | Spam |
| May 2026 core update | 21 May 2026 | 11 days, 21 hours | Core |
| March 2026 core update | 27 Mar 2026 | 12 days, 4 hours | Core |
| March 2026 spam update | 24 Mar 2026 | 19 hours, 30 minutes | Spam |
| February 2026 Discover update | 5 Feb 2026 | 21 days, 17 hours | Discover |
| December 2025 core update | 11 Dec 2025 | 18 days, 2 hours | Core |
| August 2025 spam update | 26 Aug 2025 | 26 days, 15 hours | Spam |
| June 2025 core update | 30 Jun 2025 | 16 days, 18 hours | Core |
| March 2025 core update | 13 Mar 2025 | 13 days, 21 hours | Core |
| December 2024 spam update | 19 Dec 2024 | 7 days, 2 hours | Spam |
| December 2024 core update | 12 Dec 2024 | 6 days, 4 hours | Core |
| November 2024 core update | 11 Nov 2024 | 23 days, 13 hours | Core |
| August 2024 core update | 15 Aug 2024 | 19 days, 4 hours | Core |
| June 2024 spam update | 20 Jun 2024 | 7 days, 1 hour | Spam |
| March 2024 spam update | 5 Mar 2024 | 14 days, 21 hours | Spam |
| March 2024 core update | 5 Mar 2024 | 45 days | Core |
| November 2023 reviews update | 8 Nov 2023 | 29 days | Reviews |
| November 2023 core update | 2 Nov 2023 | 25 days, 21 hours | Core |
| October 2023 core update | 5 Oct 2023 | 13 days, 23 hours | Core |
| October 2023 spam update | 4 Oct 2023 | 15 days, 12 hours | Spam |
| September 2023 helpful content update | 14 Sep 2023 | 13 days, 11 hours | Helpful content |
| August 2023 core update | 22 Aug 2023 | 16 days, 3 hours | Core |
| April 2023 reviews update | 12 Apr 2023 | 13 days, 2 hours | Reviews |
| March 2023 core update | 15 Mar 2023 | 13 days, 7 hours | Core |
| February 2023 product reviews update | 21 Feb 2023 | 14 days | Reviews |
Caption: Confirmed ranking updates from 2023 to 26 October 2026. Source: Google Search Status Dashboard. Durations preserve the dashboard’s days and hours; dates use its US/Pacific time zone. Separate ranking incidents are excluded.
What did the March 2024 core update change?
The March 2024 core update was the biggest change of the period. Google folded its separate helpful content system into core ranking, so “helpfulness” is now assessed by the main algorithm, not a separate classifier. At the same time it added three spam policies: scaled content abuse, expired domain abuse and site reputation abuse. Rollout took 45 days.
Those three policies still shape what works. Scaled content abuse covers mass-produced pages made mainly to rank, whether written by people or AI. Google has since said the policy also covers attempts to manipulate generative AI answers. That is why I do not publish a page for every keyword variation, even with AI making it cheap.
How did AI Overviews change Google search?
AI Overviews added generated answers and supporting links to the results page, starting with the US launch in May 2024. They can change whether someone needs to click. Google’s AI features use its Search index and ranking systems, including related searches through query fan-out. An ordinary top-ten position and a citation in an AI answer are different observations.
SparkToro’s US panel analysis put zero-click Google searches at about 68% for January to April 2026. That figure does not isolate AI’s effect or predict Australian enquiries. I would keep useful search pages, then measure clicks, AI citations and qualified leads separately instead of declaring one channel the cheapest without its costs and outcomes.
How do you know if a Google update affected your site?
Compare the rollout dates with Search Console changes by page, query, country, device and search type. Google recommends waiting at least a full week after a core update finishes before analysing the comparison. A sharp fall, gradual slide or single affected page can each have several causes. The shape of the graph is a clue, not a diagnosis.
- Open Google Search Console, Performance, and set the date range to three months either side of the update.
- Mark the update’s start and end dates from the Search Status Dashboard.
- Check whether clicks and position changed as a step across many pages, or slowly, or on one page.
- Check for technical causes in the same window: redirects, robots changes, server errors, a site migration.
- Check Manual Actions and Security Issues in Search Console.
- Compare with your own changes. Bulk edits and URL changes often get blamed on Google.
What happened when an update hit my own site?
My own site lost about half its Google clicks between 7 and 21 June 2026. Average position moved from about 34 to about 43 across the site. The step came one to three weeks after the May 2026 core update. No manual action or technical block showed up, so my working diagnosis is an algorithmic reassessment. That is an inference from timing, not proof: Google confirmed nothing on the day the step started, and I had made changes of my own in the same weeks.
What I found when I dug in, from Search Console data comparing March to May with July and August:
- It was site-wide, not one keyword. Australian clicks fell 59% and Indian clicks 51%. Two very different audiences dropping together points to a site-level change.
- The biggest falls were self-promotional listicles. The “best agencies” and “best maintenance” posts that ranked my own company first lost the most. That is exactly the pattern Google’s reviews and helpful content guidance warns about.
- My own changes made it worse. A service page with 20 referring domains was redirected to the homepage in May, and 50 posts were bulk-edited in the same week. Neither helped.
- A sister site took shared keywords. WP Creative now ranks for terms this site used to hold.
What I changed: I rewrote the listicles with a stated method, merged duplicate posts, fixed redirects, and refreshed posts like this one with dated, sourced facts.
How do I investigate a traffic drop after an update?
I separate the timing of a drop from its possible causes. Start with Search Console by page, query, country and device, then put the release log beside it. A site-wide change and a fall on one page call for different checks. Keep algorithmic reassessment as a hypothesis until the other evidence supports it.
These are the four views I use to keep the investigation grounded:
- Segment the loss. Compare countries, devices and page groups before calling it site-wide. Check whether clicks, impressions and position tell the same story.
- Review the affected intent. Look at which kinds of pages fell and what now answers those queries. Check the usefulness and evidence of comparison pages rather than assuming their format caused the drop.
- Read the change log. Redirects, bulk edits, templates and tracking changes belong on the same timeline as Google updates. Test their effect instead of assigning blame by date.
- Check competing pages. See whether another page or domain now meets the same buyer intent. Better targeting may matter more than another technical tweak.
Change one justified group of things, record it and compare the same segments again after Google has had time to recrawl. I want an investigation that another person can follow, with uncertainty left visible. A confident explanation without that record is still a guess.
What should you do after a Google core update?
After a core update, wait until the rollout finishes, then compare your data before acting. Google’s advice is that a drop after a core update doesn’t necessarily mean something is wrong, and that recovery comes from improving content quality, not quick fixes. Focus on whether each important page is the most helpful, first-hand answer to its query.
- Read Google’s guidance on core updates and its spam policies.
- Audit the pages that lost the most. Are they thin, outdated, self-serving or duplicated elsewhere on your site?
- Consolidate overlapping posts into one stronger page with a 301 redirect.
- Add real experience: what you did, what happened, the numbers.
- Do not chase every fluctuation. Google says some improvements take effect in a few days, others take months, and its smaller, unannounced core updates can lift a site between big ones. If months pass with no change, the next broad core update may be the one that reassesses you.
If you need to rebuild your approach to search in the AI era, my guide to SEO strategy covers what I would do now, and my post on recovering from a Google penalty covers manual actions, which are different from algorithm updates.
What to do next
- Bookmark Google’s Search Status Dashboard and check it whenever your traffic moves.
- Annotate update dates in your analytics so future drops are easy to read.
- Check your site’s speed and Core Web Vitals with a website speed test.
- Review your three biggest pages for first-hand experience and up-to-date facts.
- If you want a second opinion on a traffic drop, book a free call with my team.
Frequently asked questions
How often does Google update its algorithm?
Google changes its ranking systems thousands of times a year, mostly in small ways it does not announce. It confirms larger updates on its Search Status Dashboard: in recent years, two to four core updates and several spam updates a year. In 2026 it confirmed seven ranking updates by October.
What is the latest Google algorithm update?
As of 26 October 2026, the latest confirmed ranking update is the September spam update, which began on 24 September and ran for 13 days and 16 hours. The latest core update began on 21 May 2026. Check the dashboard for changes after this date.
Can you recover from a Google core update?
Yes, but usually not quickly. Google says improvements can be recognised within days or over several months, including through smaller unannounced updates, and sometimes not until the next broad core update. Focus on making your most important pages more helpful, more first-hand and more up to date, and consolidate weak or duplicate pages.
Is a core update the same as a penalty?
No. A core update reassesses content across the web, so some sites rise and others fall without doing anything wrong. A penalty, or manual action, is a human reviewer’s decision that a site broke Google’s spam policies, and it appears in Search Console. Spam updates sit in between: algorithmic, but aimed at policy breaches.
Do Google updates affect AI search results?
Google’s AI features use its Search index and ranking systems, but a normal search position is not a citation guarantee. Google describes query fan-out and retrieval across related searches. Track the questions and pages that appear in AI answers separately, including the Search Console generative AI performance report. Other assistants can use different retrieval systems and source mixes.
Historical Google search changes, 2000 to 2023
The archive below retains the older record and adds primary-source timelines for 2017 to 2019. A rollout start, an announcement and an indexing change are different events; the new tables identify which date is known. Industry names such as Fred and Possum are not themselves evidence of an officially named Google update. For recent confirmed ranking updates, use the Search Status Dashboard. For older changes, follow the source beside the event rather than treating every label as a diagnosis.
Google algorithm updates in 2023
March Core Update (15th March 2023)
The March 2023 core update was a broad ranking update completed on 28 March. Core updates reassess results across the web. E-E-A-T is not one specific ranking factor, and quality-rater scores do not directly set a page’s ranking.
Product Reviews Update (21st February 2023)
Product review updates prioritize content that demonstrates first-hand knowledge and expertise of the products. This update applies to content in English, Spanish, German, French, Italian, Vietnamese, Indonesian, Russian, Dutch, Portuguese, and Polish. This update was completed on March 7th.
Google algorithm updates in 2022
Link Spam Update (14th December 2022)
Google has employed its AI-based spam prevention system, SpamBrain, to detect sites purchasing links and passing outgoing links, for the first time. Consequently, the links’ values are removed, and this global update affects all languages. This Link Spam Update was completed on January 12th, 2023.
Helpful Content Update (5th December 2022)
This helpful content update enhances Google’s classifier to operate across all languages. It focuses on promoting more original, valuable content written by people, for people, rather than content primarily created to attract search engine traffic. It was completed on January 12th, 2023.
Spam Update (19th October 2022)
The spam updates target sites that don’t adhere to the webmaster guidelines, which may seek short-term gains while ignoring best practices. The update was completed on October 21st.
Product Reviews Update (20th September 2022)
The product review update prioritizes content that showcases first-hand knowledge and expertise of products specifically in English language product reviews. It was completed on September 26th.
Core Update (12th September 2022)
The September 2022 core update was a broad reassessment of ranking systems and completed on 26 September. A change in position alone does not establish a penalty or identify the particular signal that changed.
Helpful Content Update (25th August 2022)
The helpful content update focuses on promoting original, valuable content written by people, for people, rather than content mainly created for search engine traffic. The update will take up to 2 weeks to roll out.
Product Reviews Update (27th July 2022)
The product review update prioritizes content that displays first-hand knowledge and expertise of products specifically in English language product reviews. The update was completed on August 2nd.
Core Update (25th May 2022)
The May 2022 core update was a broad ranking update completed on 9 June. Core updates can change results without targeting a particular site or one named quality factor.
Product Reviews Update (23rd March 2022)
The product review update prioritizes content that showcases first-hand knowledge and expertise of products. It was completed on April 6th.
Desktop Page Experience Update (22nd February 2022)
Desktop Page Experience updates focus on highlighting pages that offer excellent user experiences, including mobile-friendliness, safe browsing, intrusive interstitials, and speed metrics referred to as Core Web Vitals. The update was completed on March 3rd.
Google algorithm updates in 2021
Product Reviews and Local Search Update (1st December 2021)
On December 21st, product review updates were completed, prioritizing content that showcases first-hand knowledge and expertise of the products.
Core Update (17th November 2021)
On November 30th, core updates were completed, which aim to make the search results better by focusing on expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness, causing significant shifts in ranking.
Spam Update (3rd November 2021)
Spam updates completed on November 11th target sites that don’t follow webmaster guidelines and may be seeking short-term gains while ignoring best practices.
Page Titles Rewrite (16th August 2021)
Google changed how titles for pages are written in the SERP, where more titles are now rewritten and each page generally has one title now. Previously, titles could change depending on the query.
Link Spam Update (26th July 2021)
An update that targeted link spam update was completed on August 24th, as part of spam updates targeting sites that don’t follow webmaster guidelines.
Core Update (1st July 2021)
On July 12th, core updates were completed, which aim to make the search results better by focusing on expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness, causing significant shifts in ranking.
Spam Updates Part 1 & 2 (23rd and 28th Jun, 2021)
June 2021 Spam updates that target sites not following webmaster guidelines were completed on the same day.
Mobile Page Experience Update (15th June 2021)
A mobile page experience update completed on September 2nd highlighted pages that offer great user experiences, including mobile friendliness, intrusive interstitials, safe browsing, and speed metrics referred to as Core Web Vitals.
Protecting People From Harassment Update (10th June 2021)
An update was completed to target sites that may engage in predatory practices when it comes to harassing people, demoting them in searches for the names of people they target.
Core Update (2nd June 2021)
On June 12th, core updates were completed, which aim to make the search results better by focusing on expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness, causing significant shifts in ranking.
Product Reviews Update (8th April 2021)
On April 22nd, product review updates were completed, prioritizing content that showcases first-hand knowledge and expertise of the products.
Passage Ranking (10th Feb 2021)
Passage ranking was improved to help specific passages within pages to rank better for relevant queries. This update was completed on February 15th.
Google algorithm updates in 2020
Core Update (3rd December 2020)
The December 2020 core update completed on 16 December. It changed Google’s broad ranking assessment. Its timing alone cannot establish why a particular page moved.
Subtopics Ranking (15th November 2020)
Google implemented subtopic ranking to better understand relevant subtopics for some search results and display a broader range of relevant content. The exact date is unknown.
Indexing & Canonicalization Bugs (20th September, 2020)
Two separate bugs occurred simultaneously and caused some instability in search results. The mobile indexing bug was fixed on October 8th, and the canonical issue was resolved on October 14th.
Core Update (4th May 2020)
The May 2020 core update completed on 18 May. As with other core updates, a ranking change calls for a page and query investigation rather than an assumption that one quality factor was responsible.
Featured Snippet De-duping (22nd January 2020)
Google made an update that ensures that a page is only listed once in SERPs, whereas previously, a page could appear as both a featured snippet and another organic listing.
Core Update (13th January 2020)
The January 2020 core update was a broad ranking update. Google’s core-update guidance explains reassessment of helpful and reliable results, rather than a single E-A-T algorithm.
For full updates and changes in Google Search Algorithms, please refer to Google’s Search Status Dashboard.
Google search changes in 2019
| Date and evidence type | Change | What Google confirmed |
|---|---|---|
| Early Nov 2019; completion confirmed 2 Dec | Local search neural matching | Google added neural matching to local results. The official confirmation gives an early-November window, not a specific launch day. Completion confirmation Google announcement. |
| 25 Oct 2019 announcement | BERT | Language understanding improved for longer, contextual queries. The launch described one in ten US English searches, with wider rollout to follow. Google BERT announcement. |
| 24 Sep 2019 rollout | September core update | Google confirmed the update was live and would reach its data centres over the following days. No exact finish is established here. Google rollout confirmation. |
| 16 Sep 2019 announcement | Review rich results | Eligibility was tightened, including self-serving LocalBusiness and Organization reviews. This affected review snippets, not every organic ranking. Google review-results announcement. |
| 12 Sep 2019 announcement | Original reporting | Google described ranking changes already made to recognise significant original reporting and keep it visible longer. This is the announcement date, not a precise rollout start. Google original-reporting announcement. |
| 10 Sep 2019 announcement | Link attributes become hints | Sponsored and ugc attributes were introduced alongside nofollow. The ranking interpretation changed then; nofollow as a crawling and indexing hint followed on 1 March 2020. Google link-attribute announcement. |
| 1 Jul 2019 effective date | Mobile-first indexing for new sites | Mobile-first indexing became the default for new sites previously unknown to Google. This was an indexing policy, not a ranking bonus for being mobile. Google mobile-first announcement. |
| 6 Jun 2019 announcement | Site diversity | Google aimed to show fewer repeated listings from one site, usually no more than two but with relevance exceptions. Google confirmed it was separate from the June core update Google site-diversity explanation. |
| 3 Jun 2019 rollout | June core update | Google confirmed the broad core update was live. The 2 June pre-announcement was advance notice, rather than its rollout date. Google rollout confirmation. |
| 7 May 2019 announcement | Evergreen Googlebot | Googlebot moved to an up-to-date Chromium renderer, with continuing updates planned. This was a rendering infrastructure change, not a named core ranking update. Googlebot announcement. |
| 13 Mar 2019 confirmation | March core update | Google said a broad core update had been released that week. This primary source confirms the update and week; it does not establish an exact start day. Google core-update confirmation. |
Google search changes in 2018
| Date and evidence type | Change | What Google confirmed |
|---|---|---|
| 2018; exact day not established here | Neural matching in web search | Google later confirmed its introduction in 2018. It helped connect concepts in queries with relevant pages. It is distinct from BERT. Google retrospective. |
| 1 Aug 2018 confirmation | August broad core update | Google confirmed a broad update released that week. Medic was an industry nickname; the announcement did not identify it as a medical-only update. Google core-update confirmation. |
| 9 Jul 2018 rollout | Mobile Speed Update | Google said rollout had started. It targeted the slowest mobile experiences and a small share of queries; relevance could still outweigh speed. Google Speed Update announcement. |
| 16 Apr 2018 release; confirmed 20 Apr | April broad core update | The Friday announcement said the update had been released on Monday. The confirmation date and release date are therefore different. Google core-update confirmation. |
| 26 Mar 2018 announcement | Mobile-first indexing rollout | Google began migrating prepared sites to mobile-first indexing. It kept a single index and used mobile content for indexing and ranking. Google indexing announcement. |
| 12 Mar 2018 confirmation | March broad core update | Google confirmed a broad core update released the previous week. The primary announcement does not identify a single exact launch day. Google core-update confirmation. |
Google search changes in 2017
| Date and evidence type | Change | What Google confirmed |
|---|---|---|
| 25 Apr 2017 announcement | Search quality improvements | Google described adjusted ranking signals to surface authoritative pages, plus rater-guideline and feedback changes. Rater scores did not directly set individual rankings. Google quality announcement. |
| 10 Jan 2017 effective date | Intrusive interstitial signal | Google began applying its announced signal to mobile pages where overlays obstructed access from Search. Responsible legal notices and modest banners were distinguished from intrusive promotions. Google launch-date update. |
2016 Google Updates
Google confirmed updates to its mobile-friendly signal and Penguin in 2016. Possum is the industry name for observed local-result changes, rather than an officially named algorithm established by the source retained here.
Major Updates
Penguin 4.0 Released (23rd September 2016)
Google announced the Penguin update on 23 September 2016. Its primary announcement emphasised real-time refreshing and more granular devaluation of spam, rather than a blanket whole-site penalty. It did not establish that the overall ranking effect was minor.
Penguin 4.0 had two major changes. The first change is now real-time. So, the Penguin’s data is refreshed in real-time which results in the quick visibility of the changes. The next change is Penguin is now more granular. Rather than affecting the whole website, it devalues the spam adjusting ranking based on spam signals.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2016/09/penguin-is-now-part-of-our-core
“Possum Algorithm Update” (1st September 2016)
Industry reporting used Possum for local-result changes observed around 1 September 2016. The linked contemporary analysis discusses filtering, location and business affiliations. It does not establish an official algorithm name, exact internal weights or a promise that a closer business always ranks higher.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/everything-need-know-googles-possum-algorithm-update-258900
Mobile Friendly Update (12th May 2016)
Google rolled out the first mobile-friendly algorithm on 21st April 2015 which was to boost the ranking of the sites with mobile-friendly pages. After one year of the mobile update, Google rolled out another mobile-friendly algorithm on 12th May 2016 with the objective to increase the effect of the ranking signal to help users find even more pages that are relevant and mobile-friendly. Those sites with mobile-friendly designs did not have any bad effects.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2016/03/continuing-to-make-web-more-mobile
Unnamed Major Update (10th May 2016)
Though Google did not confirm this unnamed major update which took on 10th May 2016, many of the MozCast and other Google Web weather trackers went through a 97-degree spike in algorithm changes. From 6th May to 13th May, there was a continuous fluctuation in Google SERP.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-no-recent-major-algorithm-update-22064.html
AdWords Change Update (23rd February 2016)
Google performed an Adword change update on 23rd February 2016. The update made a major change to Adwords by removing the ads of the right column entirely and adding 4 ads at the top blocks on many commercial searches. These paid search updates not only lead to zero sidebars in the SERP, but also leads to an increase in the bottom of the SERP ads.
Minor Updates
SERP Shake-Up (13th September, 2016)
High fluctuation in rankings, especially in the local search was seen between early to mid-September. Webmasters were pretty sure there were substantial ranking shifts however, there was no confirmation from Google about the update.
Google Core Quality Rank Update (8th January 2016)
Webmasters found lots of changes in their ranking, which they thought was a Penguin update. But, later on, Google denied it and confirmed the update was a core ranking change totally unrelated to Penguin.
Source: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-core-ranking-21460.html
Google algorithm updates in 2015
2015 was the year of mobile updates, Google decided to give a ranking boost to those sites which had mobile-friendly web pages.
Major Updates
RankBrain Related Algorithm Update (26th October 2015)
Google announced the release of the RankBrain algorithm, which uses artificial intelligence to filter results. Webmasters viewed the unusually high increase in SERP fluctuations in Google desktop for a month. This algorithm helped Google to deliver more intelligent and precisely focused related search results.
Related: https://www.rankranger.com/blog/google-brain-update-related-search
Panda 4.2 (17th July 2015)
Panda 4.2 was a 2015 refresh of the system concerned with low-quality content. It should not be described as a link-spam update. The older archive link below records industry reporting from that period.
Source: https://www.thesempost.com/google-panda-update-everything-we-know-about-panda-4-2/
The Core Quality Update: May 3, 2015
After spikes in Google desktop SERP fluctuation from April end to mid-May, Google confirmed Google core quality update on 13th May, 2015 which was called Google “Phantom 2” algorithm update. This update had a broad impact on “quality signals”.
Google Mobile-Friendly Update (22nd April, 2015)
On April 21st, 2015 Google pre-announced the Google Mobilegeddon Mobile Update to change the mobile results ranking. This update gave a boost to mobile friendly pages in Google’s mobile search results and the sites without mobile friendly design were given less priority. However, the impact of this update was much smaller than expected.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/library/google/google-mobile-friendly-update
Minor Updates
HTTPS Update (17th December, 2015)
On 17 December 2015, Google announced it would look for and prefer eligible HTTPS versions for indexing. The announcement said the slight HTTPS ranking boost had begun the previous year. This was an indexing change, not the first HTTPS ranking signal.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2015/12/indexing-https-pages-by-default
Hacked Sites Update (October 2015)
Google’s 6 October 2015 announcement described a series of changes targeting hacked spam, expected to affect roughly 5% of queries depending on language. It did not claim that every hacked site had been removed.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2015/10/an-update-on-how-we-tackle-hacked-spam
Google Snack Pack Update (August, 2015)
Google rolled out an important update in august of 2015. The update gave new design to local by removing the normal 7 packs map that shows up in the local business search results and replaced it by 3 packs map.
Source: The HOTH, on the Google local 3-pack.
Unnamed Update (4th February, 2015)
Although Google didn’t give any confirmation about the update, webmasters tracked fluctuation in Google SERPs. However, Google confirmed that the sudden movement in ranking was not related to Google Penguin or Google Panda.
Google algorithm updates in 2014
2014 was the year of the famous Google Panda Algorithm Update which hammered a lot of website rankings. Google also refreshed Pigeon and Penguin Updates. This year, Google made a big decision by removing the Google Authorship functionality.
Major Updates
Google Pigeon Expanded (22nd December, 2014)
Google expanded the Google Pigeon Algoithm update that rolled out on 24th July, 2014. Though the update was confirmed on 22nd December, but, it was rolled out as early as 19th in UK, Canada and Australia. This update brought significant volatility in Maps results in UK, Australia and Canada.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/google-pigeon-update-rolls-uk-canada-australia-211576
Penguin 3.0 Update (18th October, 2014)
Google released its sixth Penguin refresh update on 18th October, 2014. This update was smaller than expected as it only affected 1 % of US English queries whereas the original Penguin update affected >3% of the queries. Recoveries of sites penalised by previous Penguin updated were reported.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/google-releases-first-penguin-update-year-206169
Panda 4.1 (#27) (23rd September, 2014)
Google started a slow roll out of an improved Panda algorithm in early 20th of September. Few signals that helped Panda identify the low quality content more precisely were discovered in this update. This global roll-out affected 3-5% of the queries.
Source:https://searchengineland.com/panda-update-rolling-204313
Google Authorship Removed (28th August, 2014)
Google completely removed Authorship functionality from its search results and webmaster tools on 28th August, 2014. This update no longer tracked data from content using rel=author markup.
Source: https://plus.google.com/+JohnMueller/posts/HZf3KDP1Dm8
HTTPS/SSL Update (6th August, 2014)
Google announced that the sites with secure connections will be given higher priority with slight boost in the ranking from 6th August, 2014. Google carried out months of speculations before rolling out this update.
Source:https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2014/08/https-as-ranking-signal
Google Pigeon Update (24th July, 2014)
Google rolled out this local algorithm update with an aim to provide more useful, relevant and accurate local search results. This algorithm update had an impact on local search results rankings with an increase and decrease in website referrals, leads and businesses of some sites.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/google-makes-significant-changes-local-search-ranking-algorithm-197778
Payday Loan Algorithm 3.0 (12th June, 2014)
After less than a month of Payday Loan 2.0 anti-spam update, Google rolled out another major update, Payday Loan Algorithm 3.0 update. Payday Loan 3.0 targeted more spammy queries whereas Payday 2.0 targeted specifically spammy sites.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-payday-loan-3-spam-18695.html
Panda 4.0 Update (#26) (20th May, 2014)
Panda 4.0 update rolled out with lots of chatter in SEO and webmaster forums causing sharp fluctuations in search result rankings. This major update included both algorithm update and a data refresh update affecting about 7.5% of English language queries.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/google-begins-rolling-panda-4-0-now-192043
Payday Loan Algorithm 2.0 Update (18th May, 2014)
Payday Loan Algorithm 2.0 targeted very spammy queries and was totally unrelated to the Panda and Penguin algorithm. This global roll out had an impact on English queries by about 0.2%.
Page Layout Algorithm Update (#3) (6th February, 2014)
Google updated its Page Layout Algorithm, which is also known as “Top Heavy 3 Update” in the beginning of February month. This algorithm update targeted sites with too many ads above the fold in order to make search experience more efficient and quick.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/google-updates-page-layout-algorithm-go-sites-top-heavy-ads-183929
Minor Updates
Penguin 3.0 Extended (11th December, 2014)
Google spokesperson reported that the Penguin update is still rolling out and there won’t be a particularly distinct end point to the activity as Penguin is shifting to more continuous updates on 11th Decembver, 2014. It confirmed to continuously optimise the algorithm with lots of minor updates.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/google-says-penguin-shift-continuous-updates-210580
Pirate Update #2 (21st October, 2014)
A major drop in rankings of sites with pirated content or those sites which violated copyright laws were spotted. However, this update did not have much effect on sites as it specifically targeted those sites which received DMCA takedown requests.
Related: https://torrentfreak.com/googles-new-downranking-hits-pirate-sites-hard-141023/
“In The News” Box Update (October, 2014)
Google replaced the news box in the search result with the box named “In the news”. This update spiked up the news results in SERP resulting substantial traffic changes of major sites.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/googles-news-listings-beyond-traditional-205213
Private Blog Networks De-Indexed (18th September, 2014)
Google started de-indexing the sites with private blog networks which resulted in to the high drop down of the traffic of various sites.
Related: No Hat Digital, on private blog networks being de-indexed.
Photos Removed from Authorship (28th June, 2014)
To create a better mobile experience and a more consistent design across devices, John Mueller announced they were dropping all the authorship photos from SERPs on 28th June, 2014. Well, it took 3 days to complete the drop.
Related: https://moz.com/blog/bye-bye-author-pics
No Name Update (24th March, 2014)
Webmasters noticed heavy fluctuations in search result rankings which cause lots of chattering in SEO and webmaster forums. But, there was no official confirmation from Google about any update.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-update-march-18313.html
Unnamed Update (8th January, 2014)
A minor unofficial update was noticed by the webmasters though Google did not confirm it. Many people and webmasters noticed shifts in the search results.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-update-17935.html
Google algorithm updates in 2013
2013 was the year of new algorithm development and updates. Google developed and rolled out new algorithms such as “Hummingbird”, “Payday” and “Down Crowding” whose main focus were on semantic search and spammy queries.
Major Updates
Google Authorship Update (19th December, 2013)
As promised by Matt Cutts in his keynote speech at Pubcon Las Vegas in October, there was the removal of authorship mark-up from the search results. Over a period of month, 15% of authorship drop-off was noticed which was the reason for the quality to go up.
Related: Angular Marketing, on the end of Google Authorship (December 2013).
Hummingbird Update (20th August, 2013)
Google developed and rolled out a new search algorithm, called “Hummingbird” around 21st of August whose main focus was on semantic search. This algorithm was developed especially to provide more personalised results although there was no report of penalties like that of Panda and Penguin.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-update-17268.html
Knowledge Graph Expansion Update (19th July, 2013)
MozCast 10K Beta System tracked a number of queries which showed that there was an increase of over 50.4% in appearance of knowledge graph.
Related: https://moz.com/blog/the-day-the-knowledge-graph-exploded
Panda Recovery Update (18th July, 2013)
This soft Panda update rolled out over 10 day period and was more finely targeted. This update was different than other Panda updates as many webmasters who were struck by Panda update were found claiming recovery.
Source: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-panda-update-17094.html
Multi Week Algorithm Update (28th June, 2013)
A massive signs of ranking volatility was seen which peaked up on 27th of June according to data by MozCast. However, the pattern of this multi week algorithm was unclear and it did not reveal any general insights too.
Related: https://moz.com/blog/googles-multi-week-algorithm-update
Panda Dance Update (11th June, 2013)
Matt Cutts announced that they will be rolling out Panda update monthly over 10 of 30 days. Google repeated this cycle for months which many people did not expect.
Payday Loan Update (11th June 2013)
An update was made on 11th of June, 2013 to target “spammy queries” such as payday loan, pornographic and other spammed queries. This global update had roughly 0.3% impact of the US queries whereas it went higher than 4% for Turkish queries where web spam is typically higher.
Penguin 2.0 Update (#4) (22nd May, 2013)
Google released the fourth iteration of Google’s spam-fighting “Penguin Update”. This update was an update to the algorithm, not just the data refresh which affected 2.3% of the English queries.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/penguin-4-with-penguin-2-0-generation-spam-fighting-is-now-live-160544
Down Crowding Update (21st May, 2013)
In earlier days, there were problems such as one domain taking too many spots on the page. So, to solve this issue Google released down crowding update. The main goal of this update was to maintain a balance between providing diverse results and at the same time return the most authoritative search results for the query.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/google-domain-clustering-change-159997
Phantom Update (9th May, 2013)
There was a huge uptick in chatter around major ranking and search result fluctuation in the period around 9th May. Although, it was confirmed that the update was “Phantom Update” but, the exact nature of the update was unknown.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-update-now-16762.html
Minor Updates
No Name Update (17th December, 2013)
Although there was no confirmation of the update, a highest level of SERP flux was recorded since Penguin 2.0 on 17th of December. The fluctuation in results was followed for a week.
Source: https://dejanseo.com.au/2nd-biggest-serp-flux-2013/
Unnamed Update (14th November, 2013)
A large spike in chatter in the online discussion forums and social Medias were seen with the unusual activity tracked by lots of SERP tracking tools. However, there was no confirmation of this update by Google.
Related: https://moz.com/blog/was-there-a-november-14th-google-update
Penguin 2.1 (#5) Update (4th October, 2013)
Penguin 2.1, a new version of Penguin affected roughly 1% of searches to the noticeable degree. This was just an update to Penguin update as there was no major changes seen.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-penguin-21-big-17479.html
In-depth Article Update (6th August, 2013)
Google introduced new search results to help those users who are searching for in-depth articles. In-depth articles are like news results or local packs which are rich search elements and sits in the left-hand column.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2013/08/in-depth-articles-in-search-results
No Name Update (26th July 2013)
Though there was no official confirmation of the update, but many SERP tracking tools showed the signs.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-weekend-update-17142.html
Panda Update 25 (14th March, 2013)
Panda Update 25 was the last manual push of Google’s Panda update as Matt Cutts pre-announced a Panda update at SMX West and told this update would be the last update before they integrate Panda into the Google’s algorithm.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/google-panda-update-25-seems-to-have-hit-151732
Panda Update 24 (22nd January 2013)
Google announced new Panda refresh update on 22nd January 2013. This update had a noticeable impact on English queries by 1.2%.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/google-panda-update-version-24-1-2-of-search-queries-impacted-146149
Google algorithm updates in 2012
Google rolled out a number of updates in 2012. Many sites were penalised after the roll out of “Pirate Penalty” update whose main focus was to penalise those sites with too many copy right notices.
Major Updates
Panda #23 Update (21st December 2012)
Google rolled another Panda update right before the Christmas holiday impacting 1.3% of the search queries. Google said they will try to avoid updates during the holidays.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/official-google-panda-update-23-impacting-1-3-of-queries-143271
Page Layout Update #2 (9th October, 2012)
Page Layout Update, also known as “Top Heavy 2 Update” which targeted too pages with too many ads above the fold. Less than 0.7 % of English queries were affected by this update.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/google-page-layout-algorithm-update-135847
August/September 65 Changes (4th October, 2012)
Google rolled out 65 updates that happened in August/September. Some of the changes included knowledge graph, entity predictions, synonyms search features, a Panda refresh and many more.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2012/10/search-quality-highlights-65-changes.html
Exact Match Domain (EMD) Update (27th September, 2012)
Exact Match Domain update changed the way Google handled exact domains by reducing lower quality domain matches. This update had an impact less than 0.6% of search queries.
Related: https://moz.com/blog/googles-emd-algo-update-early-data
Panda #20 Update (27th September 2012)
Google rolled out another major Panda update which had an impact of 2.4% on English search queries.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/google-panda-update-20-released-2-4-of-english-queries-impacted-135291
7-Result SERPs (14th August, 2012)
With the release of “7-Result SERPs”, Google started displaying only 7 results from their traditional 10 listings per page.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/7-new-10-google-showing-fewer-results-131006
June/July 86 Google Updates (10th August, 2012)
Google released an official blog post on “June/July High Quality Highlights” which included 86 changes. Some of the changes included resource caching for mobile, images universal rankings, freshness and many more.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2012/08/search-quality-highlights-86-changes.html
DMCA/Pirate Penalty Update (10th August, 2012)
Google rolled out “DMCA”, also known as “Pirate Penalty” update which will start penalising the sites with number of copyright removal notices. The main aim of this update was to help users find legitimate, quality sources of content more easily.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2012/08/an-update-to-our-search-algorithms.html
Link Warnings Update (19th July, 2012)
Google sent a number of unnatural link warnings to webmasters in March/April saying they should act on it. But, on 20th June of 2012, Google had another announcement telling publishers to ignore the previous unnatural link warnings.
May 39 Google Updates (7th June, 2012)
Google posted a blog highlighting 39 changes they made in the month of May. It included changes like unified soccer feature, improvements to NBA search feature, improvements to news rankings, inorganic backlinks signals application and many more.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2012/06/search-quality-highlights-39-changes.html
Penguin 1.1 (#2) Update (25th May, 2012)
Google rolled out Penguin 1.1, an update to the Penguin update. This was the first update to the Penguin update launched on April 24th. The update had an impact of less than 0.1% of English searches.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/google-pushes-first-penguin-algorithm-update-122518
Knowledge Graph Update (16th May, 2012)
Google introduced Knowledge graph to discover new information quickly and easily. This SERP-integrated display provided supplement object about certain people, places and things that Google knows about.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2012/05/introducing-knowledge-graph-things-not.html
April 52 Google Updates (4th May, 2012)
Google posted a blog with 52 minor updates including categorise paginated documents, more language relevant navigational results, anchors bug fix, domain diversity, improvement on local navigational searches, better query interpretation and many more.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2012/05/search-quality-highlights-53-changes.html
Penguin Update (24th April, 2012)
This was another step by Google to reward high quality sites and penalise the sites with the black hat web spam techniques such as keyword stuffing, link schemes, link farming and so on.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2012/04/another-step-to-reward-high-quality
Parked Domain Bug (16th April, 2012)
Though it was not intentional an intentional algorithm change, Google mistaken some domains as parked domain and caused the drop in ranking.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/dropped-in-rankings-google-mistake-over-parked-domains-118979
March 50-Pack Update (3rd April, 2012)
Another batch of updates which includes Panda 3.4, improvements to handling of symbols for indexing, better scoring, site links data refresh, UI refresh, improvements to results for navigational queries, high quality sites algorithm data update, better local results and so on.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2012/04/search-quality-highlights-50-changes.html
February 40-Pack Update (27th February, 2012)
Google published a second set of search quality highlights on their Inside Search blog with 40 new updates which offered more coverage for related searches, less duplication, more locally relevant predictions, and refreshed per-URL country information and so on.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2012/02/search-quality-highlights-40-changes.html
Venice (27th February, 2012)
Google’s Venice update localised organic results on broad search queries. After this update, when a searcher typed in queries without any geo-modifier, local sites started showing up. This was surely great news for local SEOs and usability.
Related: https://moz.com/blog/understand-and-rock-the-google-venice-update
January 17-Pack Update (3rd February 2012)
Another round of search quality highlights were released by Google which included faster auto-complete, fresher results, better spelling, high-quality sites algorithm improvements, cross-language refinements, image search quality and so on.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2012/02/17-search-quality-highlights-january.html
Page layout Update (19th January, 2012)
Page layout update also known has “Top Heavy #1 Update” penalised the sites with too much of ad-space above the “fold”. This update was made with an effort to help searchers find more high-quality websites in the search results.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2012/01/page-layout-algorithm-improvement
Search + Your World Update (10th January, 2012)
Google introduced new “Search Plus Your World” feature, which turned Google+ into an essential social network for any search marketer by providing personal results, profiles in search and people and pages.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2012/01/search-plus-your-world.html
January 30-Pack Update (5th January, 2012)
Google performed a series of updates related to relevancy, image search, soft 404 detection, accuracy, more rich snippets, spam detection, safer searching, faster mobile browsing and so on.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2012/01/30-search-quality-highlights-with.html
Minor Updates
Knowledge Graph Expansion (4th December 2012)
Knowledge graph was now available in Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Japanese, Russian and Italian.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2012/12/get-smarter-answers-from-knowledge_4.html
Panda #22 Update (21st November 2012)
Another minor Panda refresh which affected 0.8% of the search queries.
Source: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-panda-22-confirmed-16017.html
Panda #21 Update (5th November 2012)
Another Panda Update affecting 1.1% of US queries in English, whereas it affected about 0.4% of queries world wide.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/google-releases-panda-update-21-138902
Penguin #3 Update (5th October 2012)
Another minor refresh to Penguin update which was not as bad as expected.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-penguin-3-15802.html
Panda3.9.2 (#19) Update (18th September, 2012)
Google rolled out another minor Panda update affecting less than 0.7% of the total search queries.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-panda-392-15720.html
Panda 3.9.1 (#18) Update (20th August 2012)
Google confirmed another Panda refresh affecting less than 1 % of the total search queries.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-panda-391-15606.html
Panda 3.9 (#17) Update (24th July 2012)
Another Panda refresh affecting 1 % of the total search queries.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/google-panda-update-3-9-128529
Panda 3.8 (#16) Update (25th June 2012)
Panda 3.8 was another minor update to Panda algorithm. It had an impact of 1 % of the total search queries.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/official-google-panda-update-version-3-8-on-june-25th-125945
Panda 3.7 (#15) Update (8th June 2012)
Google rolled out Panda 3.7 update affecting less than 1% of search queries.
Source: https://twitter.com/google/status/212205487037493249
Panda 3.6 (#14) Update (27th April, 2012)
Google confirmed another Panda data refresh. It was a limited update and did not affect that many sites.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/panda-update-3-6-on-april-27th-120227
Panda 3.5 (#13) Update (19th April, 2012)
Google quietly rolled out Panda 3.5 update which didn’t have much impact. The main target of this update was low-quality content.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/winners-losers-from-googles-webspam-update-119493
Panda 3.4 (#12) Update (23rd March, 2012)
Another Panda update which targeted low-quality websites. Panda 3.4 update had an impact of 1.6% of the search results.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/google-says-panda-update-is-rolling-out-now-116444
Search Quality Video (12th March 2012)
Google published a video into a search quality meeting for those interested in the algorithm. The video included a context about the Google’s process and their priorities. However, this was not an algorithm change.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2012/03/video-search-quality-meeting-uncut.html
Panda 3.3 (#11) Update (27th February 2012)
Another Panda refresh, which refreshed the data in the Panda system, making it more accurate and more sensitive to recent changes on the web.
Panda 3.2 (#10) Update (18th January 2012)
Google Confirmed another minor Panda update where some sites that were hit by Panda regained their traffic levels.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/google-panda-3-2-update-confirmed-109321
Google algorithm updates in 2011
A number of 10 pack updates were rolled out in 2011. The algorithm updates of 2011 had an impact of 1% to 40% of search queries.
Major Updates
December 10-Pack (1st December 2011)
Google rolled out a second round up of 10 updates including related query results refinements, more comprehensive indexing, parked domain, auto complete predictions, original content, and fresher and more complete blog search results and so on.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2011/12/search-quality-highlights-new-monthly.html
10-Pack of Updates (14th November, 2011)
Google announced 10 smaller changes that they made which included cross-language information retrieval, snippets with more page content and less header/menu content, fresh search results, rich snippets and so on.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2011/11/ten-recent-algorithm-changes.html
Freshness Update (3rd November 2011)
Google rolled out “Freshness” update affecting 35% of the total search queries. This algorithm was designed to give the most up-to-date search results.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/11/giving-you-fresher-more-recent-search.html
Query Encryption (18th October 2011)
In order to make search more secure, Google announced they would be encrypting search queries. Google enhanced their default search experience for their signed in users.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/10/making-search-more-secure.html
Pagination Elements (15th September 2011)
Google introduced the rel =“ next” and rel=”prev” link attributes to indicate the relationship between the component URLs in a paginated series. This update was a great help to the crawl and duplication problems created by pagination.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2011/09/pagination-with-relnext-and-relprev
Expanded Sitelinks (16th August 2011)
Google expanded the display of Sitelinks, creating direct access to more of the site. The number of site links per query was increased from 8 to 12.
Source: https://search.googleblog.com/2011/08/evolution-of-sitelinks-expanded-and.html
Panda 2.4 (#6) (12th August 2011)
Google rolled out Panda 2.4 internationally to most languages except for Chinese, Japanese and Korean. The main focus of this update was to return high-quality sites to users. This change in algorithm impacted 6-9% of search queries for most languages.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2011/08/high-quality-sites-algorithm-launched
Google+ (28th June, 2011)
Google launched Google+, a serious competitor to Facebook after a number of social media failures on 28th June, 2011. It was an attempt to make Google better by including user, user’s relationship and their interests.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/06/introducing-google-project-real-life.html
Schema.org (2nd June. 2011)
Google, Bing and Yahoo united together to make search listings even richer through the structures data, Schema. With the sole use of Meta data, these three search engines enhanced the search results display.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/schema-org-google-bing-yahoo-unite-79554
Panda 2.0 (#2) (11th April, 2011)
Google rolled out Panda 2.0 globally to all English-language Google users and also incorporated new user feedback signals. This user feedback signals helped people to find search results.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2011/04/high-quality-sites-algorithm-goes
The +1 Button (30th March 2011)
Google introduced +1 button on 30th March 2011 which was an easy way for Google users to share their content recommendation right from the search result pages.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2011/03/introducing-1-button
Panda/Farmer (23rd February 2011)
Panda targeted low-quality content. The archive records the first major 2011 rollout; it should not be read as a link-farm update or a description of a separate Panda system still operating today.
Related: https://moz.com/blog/googles-farmer-update-analysis-of-winners-vs-losers
Attribution Update (28th January 2011)
Google rolled out an algorithm change to drive spam levels even lower, to stop those scrapers form stealing content from others. This update affected 2% of the search queries.
Source: https://www.mattcutts.com/blog/algorithm-change-launched/
Overstock.com Penalty (January 2011)
Google penalised OverStock for implementing bad SEO practices on their site. Since then, Google started calling out sites publicly for their SEO practices.
Related: https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748704520504576162753779521700
Minor Updates
Panda 3.1 (#9) (18th November 2011)
It was another minor update to Google Panda Update. This update impacted less than 1% of searches.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/minor-google-panda-update-on-november-18th-101891
Panda “Flux” (#8) (5th October 2011)
Matt Cutts confirmed Panda “Flux” Update which had an impact of 2% of total search queries. Though Google confirmed this “Flux” update, but, they didn’t provide any detail information about this update.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/taking-a-closer-look-at-the-googles-panda-2-5-flux-97603
Panda 2.5 (#7) (28th September 2011)
Google released another Panda update as a part of a commitment to returning high-quality sites to Google users.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/confirmed-google-panda-2-5-update-arrived-this-week-95222
Panda 2.3 (#5) (23rd July 2011)
It was another small update to Google Panda filter which incorporated some new signals that helped to differentiate between the higher and lower quality sites. After this minor update, many sites ranked higher.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/official-google-panda-2-3-update-is-live-87230
Panda 2.2 (#4): June 21, 2011
Panda 2.2 was an update to the Panda filter. Some of the webmasters found their sites ranking better with this Panda filter breaking out, whereas others were hit for the first time.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/official-google-panda-update-2-2-is-live-82611
Panda 2.1 (#3) (9th May 2011)
Panda 2.1 was a minor update to Google Panda Update. This update impacted fewer rankings than in the past updates.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/its-panda-update-2-not-3-google-says-76508
Google algorithm updates in 2010
Google rolled out four major updates along with some minor updates in 2010. The major updates were Google Instant, Caffeine, Mayday and Google places.
Major Updates
Google Instant (8th September 2010)
Google Instant was an expansion to Google Suggest, which helped people get results as they type their queries. This search before type update came with features such as dynamic results, ability to predict and scroll to search.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/09/search-now-faster-than-speed-of-type.html
Caffeine Update (8th June, 2010)
Google rolled out a new web indexing system named “Caffeine” which provided 50% fresher results for web searches than the old index system. It created the largest collection of web content that Google has ever offered. Now, finding links to relevant content be it a news story or a forum post, much easier and sooner.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/06/our-new-search-index-caffeine.html
Mayday Update (1st May 2010)
The release of Google’s Mayday algorithm had a significant impact on the long tail traffic. Many sites with large-scale thin content were found hit hardly, foreshadowing the Panda update.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/archives/022293.html
Google Places (20th April 2010)
Google turned Local Business Center to Google Places with this update. Along with this change, Google added few features like services areas, business photo shoots, customised QR code, favourite places and a simple new way to advertise.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/04/introducing-google-places.html
Minor Updates
Social Signals Use (December 2010)
Google and Bing announced that they are using social signals to influence rankings. They use social data from Facebook and Twitter to ranking the site.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/what-social-signals-do-google-bing-really-count-55389
Negative Reviews (December 2010)
Google updated its algorithm to fix the issue of negative reviews. After the breaking out of the story about an eCommerce site using negative reviews to ranking in Google, Google made this rare move.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/12/being-bad-to-your-customers-is-bad-for.html
Instant Visual (November 2010)
Google introduced a magnifying glass icon on search results which allowed the user to quickly view a preview of landing pages directly from SERPs. However, this did not last too long.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/11/beyond-instant-results-instant-previews.html
Brand Update (August 2010)
Google allowed the same domain to appear multiple times on SERP. This was not an algorithm change. However, Google confirmed it to be a simple ranking change.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/google-search-results-dominated-by-one-domain-49025
Google algorithm updates in 2009
Google had a huge infrastructure change in 2009 with the introduction of “Real Time Search”.
Major Updates
Real Time Search (7th December 2009)
With the introduction of “Real Time Search”, real time became the real deal. This feature brought search results to life with a dynamic stream of real-time, mobile and social search.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/12/relevance-meets-real-time-web.html
Google Caffeine (10th August 2009)
Caffeine was Google’s huge infrastructure change, a next-generation architecture for Google’s web search. This change was intended to push the envelope on size, speed indexing, accuracy, comprehensiveness and other dimensions.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2009/08/help-test-some-next-generation
Vince Update (20th February, 2009)
Google released a major update on 20th February, 2009 which brought a significant change in how Google returned results for a certain set of keywords. Many webmasters believed the focus of this major update on trust, authority and reputation was all to support big brands.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/google-searchs-vince-change-google-says-not-brand-push-16803
Rel-canonical Tag (12th February 2009)
Yahoo, Google and Microsoft announced their support to Canonical Tag. This change allowed people to publicly specify the preferred version of an Url.
Source: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2009/02/specify-your-canonical
Google algorithm updates in 2008
This archive records the Google Suggest search-box feature and reported ranking changes in 2008. Its selection cannot establish that no other changes occurred.
Major Updates
Google Suggest (25th August 2008)
After testing literally for years, Google finally added this major search box feature. After this change, related searches automatically appeared below where you start typing in the search box.
Source: https://searchengineland.com/googlecom-finally-gets-google-suggest-feature-14626
Dewey Update (2nd April, 2008)
There was a huge discussion in the search community regarding the big changes in the Google search results, but the specifics were unclear. However, Google confirmed this was all because of “Dewey Update”, it had been a while since Google named a update. This was also the first major update widely noticed by webmasters in a while.
Related: https://searchengineland.com/google-update-dewey-google-confirms-algorithm-change-13679
Google algorithm updates in 2007
Major Updates
Universal Search (16th May, 2007)
This was not an algorithmic update by Google, rather integration to traditional search results. With universal search update, Google launched the new architecture by breaking down the traditionally separated various search properties and integrated the vast amounts of information from images, maps, books, videos and news.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/05/universal-search-best-answer-is-still.html
Minor Updates
Buffy Update (17th June 2007)
Though it was not clear what happened with this update, Matt Cutts explained that this update was simply a collection of smaller changes. The name “Buffy” was given to this update in honour of Vanessa Fox who was leaving Google.
Related: https://www.seroundtable.com/archives/013882.html
Google algorithm updates in 2006
The Bigdaddy infrastructure migration was still underway in March 2006. That change involved the framework for indexing, redirects and canonicalisation. An incomplete archive cannot establish that Google made no other changes that year.
Google algorithm updates in 2005
Major Updates
Big Daddy Update (1st November 2005)
“Big Daddy Update” was technically intended to update infrastructure. This update changed the way Google handled URL canonicalization, redirects and other many technical issues. This update was announced on 1st of November, but it rolled out for few months, wrapping up in the beginning week of March month.
Related: https://moz.com/blog/todd-greg-matt-cutts-on-webmasterradio
Jagger Update (19th October 2005)
Jagger was another significant update by Google which targeted low-quality links including link farms, reciprocal links and paid links.
Source: https://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-jagger-update-is-official/2349/
Google Local and Maps Merge (6th October 2005)
Google made it easier for searchers by merging Google local and maps together. Searchers were able to find both local search and mapping information together on the same search results page by just using Google Maps.
Source: https://googlepress.blogspot.com/2005/10/google-merges-local-and-maps-products_06.html
Google Sitemaps (2nd June, 2005)
A new program was introduced by Google, “Google Sitemaps” which allowed webmasters and site owners to create an XML files containing all their URLs that they want Google to crawl and add them in web index. However, this update was proved to be useful which gave a good influence to SEO.
Related: https://searchenginewatch.com/article/2061916/New-Google-Sitemaps-Web-Page-Feed-Program
Bourbon Update (2nd May 2005)
Google came up with an update “Bourbon” to change the algorithm in terms of how to duplicate and non-canonical (www vs. non-www) URLs are handled. This update affected 3.5% of the entire queries.
Related: https://battellemedia.com/archives/2005/06/google_update_bourbon.php
Nofollow Update (18th January 2005)
Google added a small yet very important feature “the Nofollow Attribute” which worked against the comment spam. The “Nofollow Update” was not a traditional algorithm change but had a significant impact since it combated spam and controlled outbound link quality.
Source: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2005/01/preventing-comment-spam.html
Minor Updates
Gilligan Update (8th September 2005)
Webmasters sensed changes over the web; however, Google didn’t confirm any update. Rather they claimed it was just a refresh.
Personalised Search (28th June 2005)
With the release of personalised search, users were able to use search history that they’ve been building to get the better search results. Google was able to make the results more personal and more accurate with this update.
Related: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2005/06/search-gets-personal.html
Allegra Update (2nd February 2005)
Industry observers recorded ranking changes in February 2005 under the Allegra label. The exact systems behind those changes were not established by the sources retained here.
Related: https://searchenginewatch.com/sew/news/2047678/googles-feb-2005-update
Google algorithm updates in 2004
The older archive records the industry labels Brandy and Austin for changes observed in 2004. Their reported effects do not establish that Google used a particular technology such as latent semantic indexing.
Brandy Update (17th February 2004)
Brandy is an industry name used in contemporary reporting about changes in relevance, anchor text and the index. The precise ranking systems behind those observations are not established here. Treat this entry as historical reporting, not a current optimisation recipe.
Related: https://archive.webpronews.com/insiderreports/searchinsider/wpn-49-20040217GooglesBrandyUpdateExposed.html
Austin Update (23rd January 2004)
Google came up with another update “Austin Update” to fill the hole or missing point left by “Florida Update” released on 16th November of 2003. Google was found continuing the crackdown on tricky on-page tricks; Google included invisible text and Meta-tag stuffing.
Related: https://www.searchenginejournal.com/the-latest-on-update-austin-googles-january-update/237/
Google algorithm updates in 2003
The entries below record major changes and industry labels discussed in 2003. They are a historical selection, not evidence that Google made only major updates that year.
Major Updates
Florida Update (16th November 2003)
Florida is probably the larger and aggressive updates which completely shake out SEO world. During this update, many sites that applied low-value SEO tactics like keyword stuffing and so on lost their site ranking. This update made many business owners unhappy.
Fritz Update (1st July 2003)
Google’s Fritz update ended the monthly “Google Dance”, where the index was updated every month. Instead, they came with more accurate information by the indexing every day. This every day small changes were referred as “ever flux”.
Related: https://www.wired.com/2010/02/ff_google_algorithm/
Esmerelda Update (15th June 2003)
Esmerelda update had some huge structure changes regarding Google update. This update was probably the last regular update of Google.
Dominic Update (14th May 2003)
Though the exact nature of this update was not cleared, many sites experienced bounces. Google bots were found crawling through the web and bouncing the sites right and left. This update also changed the way Google counted and reported back links.
Cassandre Update (12th April 2003)
Cassandre was yet another major update released by Google which mainly focused on basic link issues. Other main focuses of this update were massive linking from co-domains, hidden text and hidden links. Google has allowed banned sites to submit a reconsideration request in this update. This happened for the first time.
Boston Update (7th March 2003)
Google released its first named update in March month of 2003. This was the first named major update. This update had a great impact on SERPs as with this update Google improved their algorithm further.
Minor Updates
Supplemental Index (September 2003)
After Google released Fritz update, it released another update to index more documents, which would help them to do so without having to hurt the performance.
2002 Google Updates
Google’s First Documented Update (26th September 2002)
This archive begins its ranking-change chronology with industry reports from September 2002. That does not establish that Google had never changed its ranking systems before then.
Related: https://searchengineshowdown.com/2002/09/google_dance_begun/
Google algorithm updates in 2000
Google Toolbar (December 2000)
Google launched its Toolbar on 11 December 2000 for Windows users with Internet Explorer 5 or later. It displayed PageRank and provided search tools. It was a browser product launch, not a ranking update.
Source: https://googlepress.blogspot.com/2000/12/google-launches-google-toolbar.html
1998
Google was founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin on September 4, 1998. Though the domain google.com was already registered on 15th September 1997, only after a year they filed for Incorporation on September 4 of 1998. Since then the journey of Google officially began.
