Update, October 13: Google finished rolling out this update on October 8. Here's how to check whether your site was affected.
On September 24, 2026, Google started rolling out its September 2026 spam update. If you've noticed your rankings or traffic moving around this week, this is probably why. Before you change anything on your website, here's what this update is, what it isn't, and what's worth checking.
What Google announced
- It started September 24, 2026 and Google says the rollout may take up to two weeks.
- It's global, affecting searches in every country and language.
- It's the fourth spam update of 2026, following updates in March, June, and August.
- There are no new rules. Google called it a normal spam update. It's about getting better at catching things that were already against its spam policies.
Spam update vs. core update: what's the difference?
A core update changes how Google judges quality and relevance across all websites, so rankings can move even when nobody did anything wrong. A spam update is narrower. It improves Google's automated systems for spotting sites that break its spam policies.
That means most honest small business websites have nothing to fear from a spam update. If you've been building useful pages for real customers, you're not the target.
What Google counts as spam
Google hasn't said which specific tactics this update focuses on, but its spam policies cover things like:
- Scaled content abuse: publishing large numbers of low-value pages, often mass-produced with AI, mainly to grab search traffic.
- Link spam: buying links, or trading links purely to boost rankings.
- Keyword stuffing: cramming the same phrases into a page so it reads unnaturally.
- Doorway pages: near-identical pages for every town or service that exist only to rank, like "Plumber in Town A" and "Plumber in Town B" with only the town name changed.
- Hacked content added to a site without the owner knowing.
- Manipulating AI answers: Google has made clear that trying to game AI Overviews and AI Mode, for example with fake mentions or mass-produced content, also falls under its spam policies.
Don't make big changes to your website while the update is still rolling out. Rankings often bounce around during the rollout and settle afterward. Wait until Google confirms it's finished, then compare.
What to check now
- Manual actions in Google Search Console. This report tells you if a person at Google has flagged your site. For most sites it says "No issues detected," which is what you want.
- Security issues in Search Console. Hacked sites can get caught up in spam enforcement, and this report will warn you if Google has found a problem.
- Pages you didn't write. Look for strange pages, links, or text you don't recognize. That's a sign of a hacked site.
- Thin or copy-and-paste pages. If you have many location or service pages that are nearly identical, plan to combine or improve them.
After the rollout: how to tell if you were affected
Once Google says the update is complete, compare your traffic in Search Console for the two weeks after the rollout with the two weeks before. Look at your most important pages, not just the overall total. A small dip across the board is normal. A sharp drop on specific pages, lasting more than a week or two, is worth looking into.
If a spam update did hit your site, fixing the underlying problem is the only real fix. Recovery isn't instant: Google needs time to recrawl and re-evaluate your site, and that can take months.
The long-term answer
Every spam update rewards the same thing: a website that's genuinely useful to your customers. Clear service pages, honest information, real reviews, and content written for people rather than search engines will keep you on the right side of these updates.
If your traffic has dropped and you're not sure why, or you'd like someone to check your site for anything Google might see as spam, I can review it, explain what I find in plain language, and fix what needs fixing.
