Google Search

Blueprint illustration of a rank tracking chart with sudden red-flagged drops beside a Google results page where swapped listings are highlighted under a magnifying glass

Ahrefs Is Rewriting Your Rank History After Google Poisoned Up to 20% of It

Ahrefs said on October 22, 2026 that Google is "poisoning" between 5% and 20% of the search results it serves to SEO data providers, depending on the provider. Ahrefs is now filtering those pages and cleaning up past results that may have been affected, which means September and

Blueprint diagram of a Google results page where an AI Overview panel covers star-rated review listings, beside comparison boxes and a coverage gauge near 88%

AI Overviews Jumped From 30% to 89% of Review Searches in One Year

Google AI Overviews appeared on 88% of 400 tracked US commercial keywords in August 2026, up from 45.75% in September 2025, according to a Semrush study covered by PPC Land. The biggest jump hit "reviews" queries, which went from 30% to 89% coverage. Weighted by search volume,

Blueprint-style illustration of a Google search results page with crossed-out listings and a rank tracking chart that dips and rebounds

Google Now Feeds Rank Trackers Fake SERPs (8% of Them, Nozzle Says)

Nozzle analyzed 27.5 million Google results pages across 49 countries and found that 8.0% of the SERPs served to its rank tracker since September 13, 2026 were "poisoned," up from 0.17% before. On those pages a tracked site fell out of the top 10 58.

Isometric illustration of identical fake news sites strung to one hidden office, feeding an AI answer box, beside a stamped Anthropic usage policy document

Claude's New Policy Names the GEO Tactic Google Already Calls Spam

Anthropic's updated Usage Policy, published October 8, 2026 and effective November 12, bans using Claude to "manipulate the sources from which search engines or AI systems draw answers" with content that misrepresents its origin, authorship, or independence. Google's spam policy already calls manipulating AI

Blueprint illustration of a web crawler moving along a timeline ruler marked 30 days and 3-6 months, showing Google crawling, indexing and core update recovery times

Google Says Recovery Takes 3 to 6 Months, So Stop Judging SEO Fixes at Week Two

Google's Gary Illyes shared typical timing ranges for crawling, indexing and recovery at Search Central Live Deep Dive Europe in Barcelona on October 2, 2026, Search Engine Journal reported. Known URLs get refreshed roughly every 30 days, and core update recovery typically takes 3 to 6 months. Any

AI Overviews Hit 83% of Brand Searches, and Wikipedia Is Writing Them

Google showed an AI Overview on 82.9% of US desktop results for branded keywords as of September 29, 2026, up from a 61.3% monthly average in July, according to an Ahrefs analysis of 232.8 million SERP crawls. The summary that sits above your own homepage is mostly

Blueprint illustration of a Google search results page where an AI answer box covers organic links, with a small coin weighed against a stack of click arrows

Google Priced Your Content for AI Answers at 0.1% of Ad Revenue

Google is paying roughly 100 publishers through an "AI contribution pilot" for content used in AI Overviews, AI Mode and Gemini, according to The Information. For small and midsize sites, those payments work out to less than 0.1% of their ad revenue. Meanwhile, AI Overviews cut the