Google Now Says Automatically Generated Content Against Guidelines When Intended To Manipulate Search Rankings

Apr 13, 2022 - 7:51 am 11 by

Google Machine Written Content Seo

Google has updated the webmaster guidelines document to add that automatically generated content is against the guidelines only when it is "intended to manipulate search rankings." This was added to the main webmaster guidelines here the other day. However the specific document has said for the past couple of years the same language, "where it's intended to manipulate search rankings and not help users."

The page last week had a bullet point that read "Automatically generated content" as an item that is against the webmaster guidelines. Now it reads "Automatically generated content intended to manipulate search rankings." The detailed page had seemed to always have that line "where it's intended to manipulate search rankings and not help users."

So I don't think anything specific has changed with the guidance overall, since it was always in the main document.

Google recently said the quality of AI content is still not good enough for search quality purposes. But Google has also said that one day it might be.

Hat tip to Kenichi Suzuki:

Forum discussion at Twitter.

 

Popular Categories

The Pulse of the search community

Search Video Recaps

 
Video Details More Videos Subscribe to Videos

Most Recent Articles

Search Forum Recap

Daily Search Forum Recap: January 13, 2026

Jan 13, 2026 - 10:00 am
Google

Official: Apple Intelligence & Siri To Be Powered By Google Gemini

Jan 13, 2026 - 7:51 am
Bing Ads

Microsoft Advertising Now Allows Up To 50 Search Themes In PMax Campaigns

Jan 13, 2026 - 7:41 am
Google Updates

Possible Google Search Ranking Volatility Around January 12

Jan 13, 2026 - 7:31 am
Google Ads

Google Shopping Promotions Support Subscription Fees & Abbreviations

Jan 13, 2026 - 7:21 am
Google Maps

Google Hotel Knowledge Panels Posting Currently Turned Off Bug

Jan 13, 2026 - 7:11 am
 
Previous Story: Google Search Showing Image Results In Weird Snippet Location