Algorithm Lookout

The Google search algorithm timeline; A comprehensive review of all the algorithm updates and changes implemented in the mean mean Google machine over the past decade, as well as other major search engine announcements.

  1. Panda 3.2

    Google has confirmed SERoundtable’s reports of the Panda 3.2 update. There was a rumored Panda 3.2 update during the holidays but Google never confirmed it.
    searchengineland.com

  2. Panda 3.1

    Another minor Panda update, effecting less than 1% of all searches
    twitter.com/google

  3. Panda 2.5

    Google declined to share any specifics about what types of sites were targeted by the Panda 2.5 update.
    searchengineland.com

  4. Panda 2.4

    Panda update has rolled out internationally to most languages except for Chinese, Japanese and Korean. The change is said to impact 6-9% of non-English queries.
    googlewebmastercentral

  5. Panda 2.3

    Google confirmed that a small update to the Panda algorithm was made. Some sites might see traffic drops.
    searchengineland.com

  6. Panda 2.2

    This update target sites that scrape and re-publish content and are out-ranking the original source of the content.
    searchengineland.com

  7. Panda 2.1

    searchengineland.com

  8. Panda/Farmer goes international

    Google globalized their Panda update and it now affects all English-language Google users.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  9. Ability to block sites in search results

    Google adds the “Block all example.com results.” The update enable users to block specific domains from their future search results.
    googleblog.blogspot.com

  10. Panda/Farmer announced

    Google announced the Panda update – a change in the rankings algorithm directed against “low quality” content in order to drive spam levels lower.
    googleblog.blogspot.com

  11. Change to numbers in Google WMT

    Instead of showing numbers rounded to two or three digits under the ‘Impressions’ and ‘Click’ tabs, the numbers will now be shown with one or two significant digits.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  12. Algorithm change lower spam levels

    This algorithm change affected sites with low levels of original content in order to lower spam levels.
    www.mattcutts.com

  13. Confirmed Toolbar PR update

    Google has updated the PR values within the Google Toolbar.
    searchengineland.com

  14. Reading levels in advanced search

    New feature added to the Google advanced search that allow users to restrict results to a certain reading level.
    googlesystem.blogspot.com

  15. User experience algorithm change

    This algorithm change detects merchants that provide “poor user experience” and lowers their rankings.
    googleblog.blogspot.com

  16. Rich snippets for local search

    Rich Snippets helps people find web pages that reference a specific place or location.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  17. rel=alternate hreflang= announced

    Google introduced which helps multilingual sites target their international/multilingual audience more efficiently.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  18. Instant search launched

    Google instant dynamically displays relevant search results while typing and predicts the rest of the query.
    googleblog.blogspot.com

  19. SERP Breadcrumb support

    Google added support for a Breadcrumb (nickname for Google’s modification to show site hierarchies) markup format that allows webmasters to identify the breadcrumb hierarchy on their pages.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  20. Expanded results from a domain

    Algorithm change that made it easier for users to find a large number of results from a single site.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  21. Caffeine launched

    Caffeine is a search indexing system that provides much relevant and fresher results for users by indexing new pages faster and on a continuous basis.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  22. “Mayday” algorithm change

    “Mayday” was a rankings change that altered the why Google decided which sites are the best match for long tail queries. Mostly sites with no valuable content were affected by this change.
    searchengineland.com

  23. Rich snippets international

    Google announced international availability of rich snippets.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  24. Rich snippets recipes

    For certain sites with recipe content, Google users can see quick facts when these recipes pages show up as part of the search results.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  25. Site speed ranking announcement

    Site speed reflects how quickly a website responds to web requests. Currently, less than 1% of search queries are affected by the site speed signal.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  26. Toolbar PR update

    www.seodesignsolutions.com

  27. Cross-domain rel=”canonical” support

    The update helps with situations in which there’s a legitimate reason to duplicate content across different websites.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  28. Google Personal Web-search

    Google extended the personalized search to signed-out users worldwide and in more than forty languages
    googleblog.blogspot.com

  29. Googlebot-News announced

    A new user agent for robots.txt was added – Googlebot-News. The new Googlebot-News user agent can be used to specify which pages of a website should be crawled and ultimately appear in Google News.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  30. Google Social Search launched

    Google Social Search makes it easier for people to find relevant public content from their friends and contacts.
    googleblog.blogspot.com

  31. Anchors in mini sitelinks

    This search snippet enhancement provides links within the snippet to relevant section of the page, making it easier to find specific data.
    googleblog.blogspot.com

  32. Google SOAP API shut down

    Google shutdown SOAP API and replaced it with AJAX API.
    webmasterworld.com

  33. Caffeine beta test announced

    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  34. Vince update

    The Vince update gave factors such as trust, quality, PageRank and other metrics that carry the importance and value of a page, higher influence in the algorithm for generic queries.
    searchengineland.com

  35. rel=canonical announced

    Google supports a format that allows site owners to publicly specify their preferred version of a URL.
    googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com

  36. Google Webmaster Central leaves beta

    Google Webmaster Central officially came out of beta.
    searchengineland.com

  37. Googlebombs “defused”

    Google defused the “Google Bomb” That presented George W. Bush at the top of its results in a search on ‘miserable failure’.
    searchengineland.com

  38. Google stops issuing SOAP API keys

    googlerankings.com

  39. XML Sitemaps announced

    The first joint initiative between Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft to improve the Web crawl process for search engines.
    google.com

  40. Google launches Custom Search

    Google custom Search Engine permits users to create a search engine that reflects their interests.
    googleblog.blogspot.com

  41. Google acquires YouTube

    Google acquires YouTube for $1.65 billion in a stock-for-stock transaction.
    google.com

  42. Google Sitemaps announced

    Google Sitemaps was designed to help keeping Google informed about new web pages and updates and increasing the coverage of web pages in the Google index.
    googleblog.blogspot.com

  43. rel=nofollow announced

    Google introduced the rel=”nofollow” tag with intention to fight spammers. When attributed to hyperlinks, those links won’t get any credit when they rank websites in Google search results.
    googleblog.blogspot.com

  44. Florida update

    Floria update affected the rankings of websites who created backlinks with other similar sites. The new algorithm emphasized that quality content is the most important factor for search engine rankings.
    webworkshop.net

  45. “Fritz” update

    Google switched to an index that was updated every day
    mattcutts.com

  46. Google SOAP launched

    The SOAP Search API was created for developers and researchers interested in using Google Search as a resource in their applications.
    slashdot.org