August 2025 Google Search Observations

[mosxu]

AI Mode doesn’t seem to cut it either the business model is cooked:

No clicks no money!

[Martin Ice Web]

@Micha,

opposite here. We had a good week. But since yesterday all is going down the drain again.
Yesterdays g-traffic was very low. Conversions down too. Today traffic is better but conversions lack.
Seeing surges of traffic again alternating with long periods of no google traffic.
Allover g-traffic hits nearly the same numbers each day.

And bots are back. Haven´t seen them the whole week.

Sidenote: best ever month in Amazon sales

[Micha]

@martin, yes, it was the same yesterday in our shop, high traffic, hardly any conventions, I also assume that it was mostly bots. Only my news site is running (even though advertising revenue is low thanks to the summer slump).

By the way: Are you also noticing more and more English websites in German search results?

[tangor]

Hate to report that UPS or DOWNS have not been seen... Then again it is an evergreen site 20+ years old, refreshed OCCASIONALLY as NEEDED, and remains steady, expected, and consistent. That said, actively kinetic sites, new products, news, entertainment, in constant motion are SURE to be evaluated minute by minute by indexers just like the webmasters are playing the game with SEO minute by minute.

ON THE OTHER HAND (and this is from an older perspective) GIVE IT TIME! Play the minute by minute to keep things going, but calculate the RESULTS in half-year/yearly increments! Enjoy the FOREST instead of each tree! Also cuts back on the bromides and loss of sleep.

Bots, however, are a continual affliction, kind of like mosquitos. Swat 'em when necessary, otherwise ignore.

[Martin Ice Web]

@Micha,

not in my niche.
But ALL the websites in our niche have the same outlay.
h1 - picture - price - buy button - no description - no EAT - no HC

analyzed1 website:
the file has 8300 ! rows. ( while 50% is blank )
-4800 rows on top for navigation
-530 rows Content
-2970 rows of similar items and footer



website is not SE opitmized
- not minifed
- no canonical tag although there are lots of similar site that only differ in 2 words ( like lenght 1m ,2m )
- no noindex
- lighthouse index is 49

ALL of them are using Shopware as CS

with all i know about google guidelines, this websites should have been panalized for duplicate content

[Micha]

@Martin Interesting observation. I'll take a closer look at my two niches tonight; I'm curious to see what's going on there.

[Fluff_Nutz]

Anyone know what this (Not Set) traffic is in the Google Analytics? It has quite high traffic. However, it also has no engagement. Which is likely bots I'll admit. But I'm beginning to think that it is Google related. Because throughout July it contributed towards the overall traffic. Then at the end of the month, for whatever reason, G decided to decrease its traffic. Like it can end high but the next day be placed with less and lower traffic than it finished the day on. What is this about?

Why is the overall (Not Set) traffic manipulated so much? Why is it even there? Why goes GA drop it every day. as of late July, not at the start of the month? Why does it end high each day only for GA to drop it by 90% the next day? Where did the rest of its traffic disappear to?

On top of that but I got an email from my revenue provider a few days ago. Like, late July. Stating that there has been unexpected traffic raises and increases. That this needs to be rectified. Is this related to the (Not Set) traffic? Seems like a coincidence to tell me about this and this said sources is, suddenly, no longer counting towards overall traffic any more..

I'm aware its likely no one knows the answer to this and its another Google en**ification but I couldn't help but be curious.

[Whitey]

The post June core update volatility continues into August:

Google Tracking Third Party Tools

Here is what the tools have been showing - it seemed to spike on Thursday, July 31st and into today, August 1st: [seroundtable.com...]

[saladtosser]

Remember that post from Danny pleading for people to stop surfacing “Google stuff users can’t see” a few months back?

I still think this update is punishing technical SEO, treating strong implementations as “over-optimization.”

I’m seeing non-mobile sites now I haven’t seen in years come back into visibility, and sites where I’ve deliberately degraded technical CWV, SEO/UX (removed TOCs, breadcrumbs, schema, etc, lazy loading.) are overtaking what are perfect UX properties.

Feels like Google’s ranking signals are reverting to early-2000s-era behavior. I’ve got the legacy designs saved, time to double down on testing.

Anyone else with solid technical foundations (CWVs, accessibility/usability, TOCs, breadcrumbs and matching rich schema) seeing drops?

[shadowlight]

Anyone else with solid technical foundations (CWVs, accessibility/usability, TOCs, breadcrumbs and matching rich schema) seeing drops?

Yes and seeing a lot of sites that aren't optimized rising like you described. Seeing a lot of info sites for transactional search terms that do not provide the product or service users are clearly looking for when using these search terms too.

The SERPS are more cluttered and an additional 'search feature' labelled people also consider that I haven't noticed before is appearing a lot, this 'search feature' is weirdly labelled as sponsored despite being identical to PASF, it contains nothing more than a list of search terms that lead to more SERP's.

[haramamba]

@saladtosser
I'm doing the same thing. Just removed TOC. Disabled css/html compression a week ago. I have several ld+jsons and thinking of removing them.

[haramamba]

@saladtosser
I'm doing the same thing. Just removed TOC. Disabled css/html compression a week ago. I have several ld+jsons and thinking of removing them.

[saladtosser]

@haramamba make sure you back up the good version of your site so you cant revert it if googles goas back to ranking good UX so you can easily revert. I am only doing this on my test sites (used to be owned, friends that died during covid, I retained the domains/sites for testing) currently.

[christianz]

Anyone else with solid technical foundations (CWVs, accessibility/usability, TOCs, breadcrumbs and matching rich schema) seeing drops?

I don't buy this theory. Penalizing sites for good speed optimization and some honestly implemented technical SEO would be too stupid even for Google.

Feels like Google’s ranking signals are reverting to early-2000s-era behavior.

It definitely feels like they disabled latest/best spam filtering tech they had. Overall the ranking is way less intelligent. It has forgotten which sites are actually real sites and which are not.

I am surprised they still haven't reverted it back. Although I have seen them doubling down on very strange decisions for months.

I'm doing the same thing. Just removed TOC. Disabled css/html compression a week ago. I have several ld+jsons and thinking of removing them.

99.9% sure this is not the problem. But there is definitely something to the fact that Google prioritizes crappy websites. However, slow loading, unstable layout and absence of any schema is most likely not the specific type of crappiness their current algo is looking for.

[saladtosser]

I can only say what I see from searching and my own test sites I have purposely made worse, im hoping they haven't overlaid any of the technical side of the algo yet and this reverts but we know Google entification is happening and delivering poor UX sites will condition people away from traditional search sites to overviews so I wouldn't put it past them.

I wouldn't mess around with important sites right now, I would and am doing NOTHING and wont touch my passion project for 6 months minimum. But run the top results through lighthouse in chrome right now and you will see what I mean. As a full stack hand coder who builds web apps from the ground from the DB design to the CSS with UX first and foremost for technical SEO and speed It looks bad, really bad what they are ranking. Its all sites that are either super old forgotten, sites I have never come across and all have no technical SEO or UX (there are exceptions) !

Its possible CWVs and other UX has been degraded as a ranking factor in this update like HTTPS way back when...

At the time of posting I only see what I classed as solid sites that held ranks for over 10 years (through HCU) now de ranked and the only difference I can see in the sites that replaced them have bad UX over good, backlink profile on the de ranked sites is more solid. I just hope its not finished yet (clearly isn't)! Just for clarity im talking ecom/local sites).

Don't take my word though, pull out chrome, scan with lighthouse the sites currently at the top then go down the ranks (though TBH a lot of sites are horrendous and would rather pay out on links than UX) ...

[haramamba]

@saladtosser

make sure you back up the good version of your site so you cant revert it if googles goas back

 <?php if($IS_CRAWLER && $IS_CHEATING) { ?>

Yes, I know how G people call this code, but I don't care.
I try not to shock visitors with ugly design from 2000's.

[Conro]

Today the ai act came into force in Europe. I have the feeling that nothing will change regarding copyright and AI companies will be able to continue to plunder the web and not only as if everything were free. At least Google had left the serps as before hcu, at least the damage would have been less painful even knowing about the theft of content, but there is little to do, they don't know why it is possible to trample on all the copyright laws in the world [euronews.com...]

[Micha]

@martin you're right, there are lots of sites in my shop's niche that are structured exactly as you described. It's not like that in the niche of my news site, but Tagesschau and similar sites have gained significantly in visibility.

What I've also noticed is that, according to Matomo, directories that haven't existed for years are being accessed on my pages, and even very old articles that are perhaps accessed once a year are suddenly getting a lot of traffic from Google. I guess that's because of the AI responses.

@corno At least Google will leave everything as it is. Companies still have some time before they have to implement it, but I don't think Google in particular will change anything. If there is a penalty, there will be years of litigation, and then the petty cash fund will come into play.

[Conro]

Searchliaison has abandoned us definitively. The "Good Guy" sent a strong signal [x.com...]

[ichthyous]

Seeing a sharp increase in direct traffic since July 27th...up 73% today alone. Meanwhile search traffic is tepid, and even down 8% today. I see a lot of people here asserting that direct traffic is mostly just bot traffic. Looking at my analytics I see that dwell time in general is lower for direct traffic than search traffic, but the source of the traffic appears to be natural. Is anyone else seeing a sharp rise in direct traffic this past week?

[Fluff_Nutz]

@ichthyous

Yes, for me, direct traffic is the current highest in my list of sources. After loosing 2 of my others. One completely dropped and the other still counts until the next day. When Analytics decides I, no longer, deserve that traffic any more. For some reason. Despite contributing towards my overall traffic all month, last month. Now it no longer does.. It's tiring..

But, going back to Direct Traffic. It does contain bots. It is where I found my German bot invasion, which is still on-going. Huge spike of traffic, which was not normal. I'm not saying its all bots. Just keep an eye on it. Bots do, still, dwell, in that category.

[RubicCubed]

Searchliaison has abandoned us definitively.

Google used that position to spread disinformation and false hope knowing all along the primary purpose of AI O is to replace organic results so Google can retain all the traffic.

[Fluff_Nutz]

Which they are doing an amazing job of right now. Myself and several others are not even getting increased traffic. We are practically, ''just hanging''. Minor drops at times and that is it.

Also, I'm finding it humorous and interesting how a group of Redditors are planning to boycott Youtube this month. Due to the AI ID implementation. Where AI is meant to know viewers ages and block them if they happen to be under 16. I'm sure that will go well. On top of trying to boycott the platform, they have also created a petition against it. G are destroying both Search and Youtube and annoying everyone in the process. I doubt it will work but I respect their efforts.

Also, on Reddit is a subreddit called 'Degoogle' where people are, literally, trying to move away from anything and everything Google related. Long term G will kill themselves. But sadly this will take too long to actually happen. Whilst the rest of us suffer.

[bgweb]

The Google AI mode is now rolling out in the UK. I know it’s been available in the USA (and perhaps other countries?) for a while now. What I see rapidly coming into view is the end for many publishers. This will be Darwinian, with a smaller cake being shared by fewer publishers in the short to medium term. In the longer term, perhaps in two years' time, the way the web operates may well be completely upended.

[ichthyous]

The Google AI mode is now rolling out in the UK. I know it’s been available in the USA (and perhaps other countries?) for a while now. What I see rapidly coming into view is the end for many publishers.

I have been seeing lower, and more unstable UK traffic in the last 10 days for sure. Today my UK traffic is -33%...suspiciously low, although it is still early. It's also summer vaca time and it makes a huge difference.

What I am seeing in USA results is an expansion of AIO across more and more search terms. Any term that is potentially informational in nature now has AIO taking over at least half the page, then Youtube videos, people also ask, sometimes image blocks or local search.

The organic search results are ALL how-to articles and videos now. If you are actually selling the item as opposed to just a how-to article, then lots of luck, you are being pushed to last spot on page one, or top to middle of page two.

Google has made a definite decision for us, anything commercial in nature will not get visibility at all...they want to push that to the product search tab. I don't waste time on Google product search, it's just a sea of cheap crap rock bottom price items from huge brands and just not worth the effort. Since my items are all relatively high price point there is no point in listing them in cheap product searches, nobody will click on them.

So effectively there is no home anymore at Google for my business. The number of leads has been a trickle since April, and the kinds of leads are so poor in quality they get deleted as they come in. This also has to do with the shadow recession here in the US and in Europe. We are seeing the job market crash and burn in US since May, and higher prices for everything are about to hit hard. People stopped spending in advance several months ago. It's not always all about Google...

[EditorialGuy]

The organic search results are ALL how-to articles and videos now. If you are actually selling the item as opposed to just a how-to article, then lots of luck, you are being pushed to last spot on page one, or top to middle of page two.

I see the opposite in many cases: commercial results for informational queries. It's all a crapshoot, apparently.

[makintocheplus]

All traffic gained during the last core update is gone... Google doing Google stuff... 0% trust.
But RPM is up 60% in AdSense...

[seomotionz]

All traffic gained during the last core update is gone... Google doing Google stuff... 0% trust.
But RPM is up 60% in AdSense...

Don't give false hope. RPM rates are up but only for traffic from certain countries. And also since the move from clicks to RPM, rates were pretty low even for traffic from tier one countries. So, in my opinion if your have good traffic then you are bound to get good rates. Even though they are increasing I am seeing 99% of site sites are still below a dollar.

[makintocheplus]

Don't give false hope.

Well my traffic is from France mostly (95%), I am saying only what I have seen in first few days of August compared to July.
I said that I lost all Google traffic that was gained in the June 2025 Core Update.

[RubicCubed]

I still think this update is punishing technical SEO, treating strong implementations as “over-optimization.”

an additional 'search feature' labelled people also consider that I haven't noticed before is appearing a lot, this 'search feature' is weirdly labelled as sponsored despite being identical to PASF, it contains nothing more than a list of search terms that lead to more SERP's.

Google isn't punishing technical SEO, but are pulling rabbits out of their hat to make users search more by presenting them with low quality content and refinements. Reading the entire court document from 2019 ( [justice.gov...] ) will put it into perspective since they discuss turning off ranking improvements and placing refinements all over the page - both of which they have done to reduce quality to force users to search more.

"We could increase queries quite easily in the short term in user negative ways (turn off spell correction, turn off ranking improvements, place refinements all over the page). If we, as a company, want to go there we should discuss that. It is possible that there are trade offs here between different kinds of user negativity caused by engagement hacking. But I will say that I am deeply deeply uncomfortable with this, and I'd be surprised if the ads team wants this. The nature of how you would easily increase queries is a key reason I don't like queries as an end metric. The easy ways are almost all bad. Having queries as a metric will, in my opinion, have a subtly bad effect as a launch metric even if we ' decide not to do the bad things'."