Google: Sharing IP Addresses On Shared Servers Is Normal & Fine For SEO

Google's John Mueller for the umpteenth time said that sharing IP addresses and/or having your site on a shared server and/or using a CDN that does all of that, is fine for Google Search, SEO and ranking. In fact, he said it is "normal" for sites to do this.

John wrote on X, "There are a limited number of IP addresses, it's normal for them to be shared." This was in response to the concern that sharing IPs or hosting with spammy sites can hurt your SEO:

There are a limited number of IP addresses, it's normal for them to be shared.

— John (@JohnMu) April 3, 2024

I mean, there are super rare cases where Google has banned hosts completely and wipped out a whole ccTLD of sorts. But that is super rare, which I guess is where the rumors started from.

John Mueller added on X when someone said, "Discovered via Reverse IP lookup tool: one of my websites shares an IP with 129 others, many spammy. Could this harm my site's reputation?" He responded, "tldr: no."

He added:

This is how CDNs work, it's also how shared hosting works. Also, CDNs often use a globally distributed set of datacenters, so the IP address can change depending on time/location. Search engines have practice dealing with this.

tldr: no
This is how CDNs work, it's also how shared hosting works. Also, CDNs often use a globally distributed set of datacenters, so the IP address can change depending on time/location. Search engines have practice dealing with this :-).

— John (@JohnMu) April 3, 2024

In 2019, Google said this before - saying sharing IP addresses is okay and in 2016 he said don't worry about IP addresses. This was a concern in like the early 2000s but really is not a thing today.

Again, this is not new but I figured I'd share this information again based on people asking.

This stemmed when John Mueller told CDNs to stop blocking Googlebot:

If you use a CDN set to be aggressive about handling bots, Googlebot won't be able to get through - and nothing will get indexed.

*cough* @Cloudflare https://t.co/0NpKKy20KG

— John (@JohnMu) April 2, 2024

Forum discussion at X.