The August 2026 Google spam update.

What brands moved in the update, and what to do about it.

Partner workshop · Tuesday 22 September 2026
The method

What we looked at.

What

  • Every brand on the estate, swept around 18 August 2026, the August spam update.
  • The cohort that fell on that day, and the cohort that rose on the same day.
  • A brand counts only if the change held weeks later, so a dip that recovered is left out.

Why

  • To look at the platform as a whole, rather than one brand at a time.
  • To find trends and patterns.
  • To look at how the earlier updates this year affected that same cohort.
The landscape

Landscape for affected brands on 18 August.

18 August, the cliff both cohorts are measured from this day Daily registrations from late March to mid September. A grey estate line runs flat across the top. An orange line and a green line track each other closely through the March, May and June update bands with no separation, then scissor violently apart at the August band on 18 August, orange collapsing and green stepping up. March spam, then core24 Mar · 27 Mar to 8 Apr May core update21 May to 2 Jun June spam update24 to 26 Jun August spam update18 to 21 Aug
The whole estate Brands that fell on 18 August Brands that rose on 18 August A Google update
Underneath the lines

Brands with falling registrations.

18 August, the cliff Twelve individual brand lines for the brands that fell, spiky and overlapping through the year, all dropping to near the floor after 18 August. March spam, then core24 Mar · 27 Mar to 8 Apr May core update21 May to 2 Jun June spam update24 to 26 Jun August spam update18 to 21 Aug
Underneath the lines

Brands with rising registrations.

18 August, the cliff Twelve individual brand lines for the brands that rose, flat and overlapping through the year, with a cluster of spikes at 18 August. March spam, then core24 Mar · 27 Mar to 8 Apr May core update21 May to 2 Jun June spam update24 to 26 Jun August spam update18 to 21 Aug
What we are seeing

Brands rebuilt with the toolkit have come through well.

  • ✓ The brands partners have rebuilt with the agentic toolkit have mostly seen a positive impact through the recent updates.
  • ✓ A rebuilt page is the current generation. Current markup, schema and metadata, rather than whatever the page was built with years ago.
  • ✓ It is the one thing you can actually do. You cannot change what Google did. You can change what it crawls next time.

The brands that were not hit are the ones worth rebuilding first.

What to do

The sixteen spam policies.

CloakingDifferent content for Google Doorway abusePages that funnel, not serve Expired domain abuseOld domains bought for rankings Hacked contentContent placed by an attacker Hidden text and link abuseText only search engines see Keyword stuffingTerms repeated to rank Link spamLinks built to move rankings Machine-generated trafficAutomated queries sent to Google Malicious practicesMalware and unwanted software Misleading functionalityPromises content it cannot give Scaled content abuseMany pages, little original value ScrapingSomeone else's content, republished Site reputation policyThird-party content borrowing your standing Sneaky redirectsVisitors sent somewhere they did not ask for Thin affiliationMerchant copy, nothing added User-generated spamSpam your own users posted

Each policy links to Google's own definition, in a new tab: developers.google.com/search/docs/essentials/spam-policies

Over to you

Assessing your portfolio.

1Have you had brands affected?
2Any idea why? Can you see patterns?
3What to change on the brands that were affected, and more importantly on the ones that were not, with an eye on future updates.

Thoughts? Discussion?

August 2026 spam update ·  what moved, and what to do
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