Google's September 2026 spam update is finished. It started rolling out on September 24, and Google's Search Status Dashboard marked it complete on October 8, about two weeks later. If your traffic moved around in that time, now is the moment to find out whether the update had anything to do with it.
The good news: early reports suggest most sites saw little or no impact. Here's how to check your own site properly, without jumping to conclusions. (New to this update? Start with what Google's spam update is and what it targets.)
Step 1: Check for a manual action first
Open Google Search Console and go to Security & Manual Actions. Check two reports:
- Manual actions: if a person at Google has flagged your site, it will say so here, along with the reason. "No issues detected" is what you want to see.
- Security issues: this warns you if Google has found hacked content or malware. Hacked sites can get swept up in spam enforcement, often without the owner knowing.
Step 2: Compare before and after
In Search Console, open the Performance report and use the date filter's Compare option. Compare a period before the update started, like September 10 to 23, with the same number of days after it finished, starting October 9. Give it at least a week or two of post-update data; a few days isn't enough to see a real pattern.
- Look at clicks and impressions, not just your average position, which can move around for many reasons.
- Switch to the Pages tab to see which pages gained or lost the most. A spam-related drop usually hits specific pages or sections, not your whole site evenly.
- Check the Queries tab to see whether you lost visibility for your most important searches, like your main service and town.
A small dip across the board is normal week to week. What you're looking for is a sharp drop on specific pages that started during the rollout and hasn't come back.
Step 3: Rule out the other usual suspects
Not every traffic drop in late September was caused by Google. Before blaming the update, check these:
- Seasonality. Compare with the same weeks last year. Many businesses naturally slow down or pick up in the fall.
- Changes to your own site. A redesign, new plugin, changed page addresses, or a page accidentally set to noindex can all cause drops.
- Tracking problems. If Google Analytics shows a drop but Search Console doesn't, the issue may be your tracking code, not your rankings.
- Reporting delays. Search Console's data runs a few days behind and was reported to be delayed around October 11, so make sure the latest days have fully filled in.
- Competitors and AI answers. A competitor may have improved, or an AI Overview may now answer the question directly. Search Console's AI performance report, now available worldwide, shows how often your pages appear in AI Overviews and AI Mode.
If your site was affected
If specific pages dropped sharply during the rollout and nothing else explains it, look at those pages honestly. Spam updates target things like:
- Large numbers of thin or near-identical pages, such as the same service page repeated for every town with only the name changed.
- Mass-produced content written mainly to rank, including unedited AI content.
- Paid links or link schemes.
- Hacked pages or content you didn't create.
How to recover
Fix the underlying problem: improve or combine thin pages, remove spammy content, and clean up anything hacked. If you have a manual action, fix the issue and then submit a reconsideration request in Search Console. If there's no manual action, there's nothing to submit. Google's systems re-evaluate your site automatically as they recrawl it.
Be patient. Recovery from an algorithmic spam update usually takes months, not days, and often isn't visible until Google's systems have had time to see the changes across your site.
If you weren't affected
That's the most common outcome for honest small business sites. Use the update as a reminder to keep your site clean: avoid shortcuts, keep content useful and accurate, and set up free tools like Search Console so you can spot problems early next time.
If your traffic dropped and you can't tell why, I can review your Search Console data, find what changed, and give you a plain-English plan to fix it.
