Google search quality guidelines updated today

Google has updated its search quality raters guidelines today, this is an update from the October 2021 update. You can download the full 167-page PDF raters guidelines over here. This version has refreshed language in the new overview section, a refined YMYL section, with more on low-quality content, YMYL, E-A-T, and more.

What is new. Google posted these bullet points on what is new on the last page of this PDF.

• Refreshed language to be aligned with the newly published Search Quality Rater Guidelines: An Overview
• Refined YMYL to focus on topics that require a high level of accuracy to prevent significant harm; added a new table of examples and refreshed existing examples
• Added clarifications to Low and Lowest Page Quality sections to emphasize that the type and level of E-A-T depends on the purpose of the page, and that low quality and harmful pages can occur on any type of website
• Refactored language throughout to be applicable across all devices types
  Minor changes throughout (updated screenshots; removed or updated outdated examples and concepts; removed user location when irrelevant; etc.)
• Also, the previous version was a 171-pages, this revised document is 167-pages.

Why we care. Although search quality evaluators’ ratings do not directly impact rankings (as Google clarified in the document), they do provide feedback that helps Google improve its algorithms. It is important to spend some time looking at what Google changed in this updated version of the document and compare that to last year’s version of the document to see if we can learn more about Google’s intent on what websites and web pages Google prefers to rank. Google made those additions, edits, and deletions for a reason.

You can download the 167-page PDF raters guidelines over here.