Are Animated Google+ Profile Pictures Acceptable For Authorship?

Apr 2, 2013 - 8:50 am 15 by

Google announced on Google+ twice that you can now use an animated GIF for your profile photo.

What does that mean? Well, here is Google's Matt Steiner with an animated profile photo, as an animated GIF:

Animated Google+ Profile Pictures

Cute? Yes. Geeky? Oh yeah! But I have a concern.

Google has told us that our authorship headshot has to be of some quality. We know that Google uses the Google+ profile photo in many cases as the authorship photo. We also know that most of us would not consider animated GIFs acceptable quality for a writer's headshot.

Would an animated GIF work for authorship in Google's search results snippets? If so, would Google only show one frame or let them be animated in the search results?

If I had to guess? Google will not use animated GIFs as authorship thumbnails in the search results.

I personally will not be testing this.

Forum discussion at Google+.

This story was scheduled to be posted today and was not written today.

 

Popular Categories

The Pulse of the search community

Search Video Recaps

 
Video Details More Videos Subscribe to Videos

Most Recent Articles

Google News

Google Won't Be Broken Up In Monopoly Case But Required To Share Search Data

Sep 2, 2025 - 5:50 pm
Search Forum Recap

Daily Search Forum Recap: September 2, 2025

Sep 2, 2025 - 10:00 am
Google Search Engine Optimization

September 2025 Google Webmaster Report

Sep 2, 2025 - 7:51 am
Google Ads

New Google Ads Checkboxes To Filter Campaigns

Sep 2, 2025 - 7:41 am
Google Ads

Google Ads AI Max Not Designed To Go More Aggressively After SPN Inventory

Sep 2, 2025 - 7:31 am
Google Ads

Google Ads Search Google Maps For Location Assets

Sep 2, 2025 - 7:21 am
 
Previous Story: Most SEOs Feel Google Gives Brands Preferential Treatment