Google: Responsive Design Doesn't Give You A Ranking Boost

Oct 18, 2013 - 8:29 am 23 by

Responsive Web Design & GoogleGoogle's John Mueller posted in a Stack Exchange thread that responsive design doesn't give you a ranking boost.

Yes, Google does officially recommend responsive as the approach to going mobile. But going responsive, doesn't give you more of a ranking boost that using any of the three accepted approaches to smartphone optimized sites.

Google does demote non-mobile friendly smartphone sites from ranking so well on mobile. And if you mess up with the techniques, they can hurt.

But responsive over different HTML with same URL, doesn't necessarily give you a ranking boost.

Google's John Mueller said:

No. Google currently doesn't differentiate sites like that.

You may see indirect effects (smartphone users liking your responsive site and recommending it to others), but we don't use that as a ranking factor. We are starting to use common configuration errors to adjust the rankings in smartphone search results though.

Forum discussion at Stack Exchange.

 

Popular Categories

The Pulse of the search community

Follow

Search Video Recaps

 
Google Core Update Volatility, Helpful Content Update Gone, Dangerous Search Results & Ads Confusion - YouTube
Video Details More Videos Subscribe to Videos

Most Recent Articles

Google Maps

Google Maps No Longer Will Support Draft Reviews

Apr 17, 2024 - 7:51 am
Google Search Engine Optimization

Google Search Console Adds Unused Ownership Tokens

Apr 17, 2024 - 7:41 am
Google Ads

New Google Ads AI Generated Image Tool For Demand Gen Campaigns

Apr 17, 2024 - 7:31 am
Google

Google Tests Horizontal Lines For Sitelinks & People Also Ask

Apr 17, 2024 - 7:21 am
Google Search Engine Optimization

Google: Should We Explain The Crawl Stats Report in Search Console

Apr 17, 2024 - 7:11 am
Search Forum Recap

Daily Search Forum Recap: April 16, 2024

Apr 16, 2024 - 4:00 pm
Previous Story: Google: Stop Using Fake Google+ Profiles To Trick Users