Search Quality Rater Guidelines
What are Search Quality Rater Guidelines?
The Search Quality Rater Guidelines are a public document Google gives to the external human raters who evaluate search results. Raters use it to judge page quality, including E-E-A-T, and how well results meet the needs of a query. Their ratings help Google test changes to its ranking systems, but don’t directly change any page’s ranking.
The guidelines cover Page Quality rating (the purpose of a page, its main content, the reputation of the site and creator, and E-E-A-T) and Needs Met rating (how well a result serves the searcher’s likely intent). They define YMYL topics and describe what lowest-quality pages look like, such as deceptive, spammy or harmful content. Google updates the document from time to time.
Raters work on real queries and are asked to think about the needs of people in their own locale. Their ratings are combined to evaluate proposed changes: Google runs experiments, compares results with and without a change, and uses rater judgements as one input in deciding whether to launch it. The guidelines are therefore a statement of what Google wants its systems to achieve, not a list of ranking factors.
Why Search Quality Rater Guidelines matter for SEO
The guidelines are the most detailed public description of what Google considers good and bad content. Reading them helps you understand the direction of Google’s ranking systems, even though raters don’t set rankings.
They are especially useful for YMYL sites and for recovering from core updates, as they spell out what high and low quality look like.
How to use the quality rater guidelines
- Download the current version from Google and read the sections on page quality and E-E-A-T.
- Assess your own key pages as a rater would: purpose, main content, reputation, trust.
- Search for independent reviews and mentions of your brand, as raters are told to do.
- Use the lowest-quality examples as a checklist of things to remove.
Search Quality Rater Guidelines FAQ
Do quality raters affect my rankings?
No. Google says rater ratings don’t directly affect rankings. They are used to measure whether Google’s systems are producing good results.
Where can I read the Search Quality Rater Guidelines?
Google publishes them as a free PDF, linked from its Search Central documentation and its How Search Works site.
Related SEO terms
E-E-A-T stands for experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness: the qualities Google’s quality raters look for in content.
YMYL (Your Money or Your Life)
YMYL (Your Money or Your Life) means topics that could affect someone’s health, finances, safety or wellbeing, where Google applies higher standards.
Helpful content is Google’s term for people-first content made to help readers, not to rank. Since 2024 it is assessed by Google’s core systems.
A Google core update is a broad change to Google’s main ranking systems, released several times a year, that can move rankings for many sites.
Search intent is the reason behind a search: what the person wants to know, find or do. Matching it is one of the most important parts of SEO.