Freshness update (2011): what it changed and what it means now

What Google changed#

On 3 November 2011, Google announced “a significant improvement to our ranking algorithm” on its official blog. It was designed to better determine “when to give you more up-to-date relevant results” for searches with different freshness needs.

Google gave three kinds of search that benefit: recent events or hot topics, such as breaking news; regularly recurring events, such as elections or earnings; and information that changes often without being a hot topic, such as product reviews. Google said the change built “upon the momentum from Caffeine,” the indexing system it completed in 2010. Google called this a freshness algorithm; its ranking systems guide now calls the family “freshness systems.”

When it rolled out#

Google said “today we’re making a significant improvement” in its post of 3 November 2011, so that is the start date used here. Google stated no completion date.

What is known about its impact#

Google’s post said the change “impacts roughly 35 percent of searches.” On 7 November 2011 it added a clarification: that figure meant at least one result on the page changed. On its usual scale of changes an average user would notice, Google wrote, “this change noticeably impacts 6 - 10% of searches, depending on the language and domain.”

What site owners should do#

Freshness still exists in Google ranking. Google’s ranking systems guide lists “query deserves freshness” systems among its active systems, “designed to show fresher content for queries where it would be expected.” Google’s helpful content guidance adds a warning against faking it:

• Update pages on topics that change, such as prices, schedules and product details, when the facts actually change.
• Do not change a page’s date to make it look fresh when the content has not substantially changed.
• For evergreen topics, a well-maintained older page can still be the best result.

How to check whether it affected you#

This is historical. Search Console keeps 16 months of data, so November 2011 can only be checked in archived analytics, by comparing traffic to news and time-sensitive pages before and after 3 November 2011. The Google Algorithm Updates timeline lists every update with its dates.

Related updates#

• The Caffeine indexing system was the index this change built on.
• Hummingbird was the next major ranking system change, in 2013.