What is a Google core update?
Google makes changes to its search algorithm constantly. Most are small, undocumented, and barely noticeable. Core updates are different. They’re broad changes to how Google evaluates and ranks content across the web, and Google usually announces them by name (e.g. “March 2025 Core Update”).
The goal, according to Google, is to get better at surfacing “relevant and authoritative content.” In practice, that means the ranking signals Google uses to evaluate pages get recalibrated. A site that ranked well before an update might drop if the new weighting deprioritises something it was strong on, and vice versa.
Core updates aren’t penalties. They’re not targeting your site specifically. They’re changes to the scoring system, and your rankings shift based on how your content compares to everyone else under the new rules.
How often do they happen?
Google typically releases a few broad core updates per year, usually spaced a few months apart. Each rollout can take one to two weeks to fully complete, meaning you might see ranking changes continue well after the announced start date.
Outside of core updates, Google also runs other types of updates targeting specific things like spam, product reviews, or helpful content. These are separate from core updates, though the lines blur sometimes.
Why do rankings change during a core update?
If your rankings drop after a core update, it doesn’t mean you’ve done something wrong or that your site was penalised. What it usually means is one of the following:
Your competitors improved. Google’s rankings are relative. If other sites in your space got significantly better content, better authority, or better signals, they may have moved up, pushing you down.
Google re-evaluated how it reads your content. The way Google understands topics, author expertise, and content depth changes over time. A page that seemed authoritative under the old signals might look thinner under the new ones.
Your content hasn’t kept up. If your pages haven’t been updated in a year or two, and the topic has changed, Google may start to favour fresher or more thorough coverage from competitors.
What to do when a core update hits
1. Wait for it to finish
Core updates roll out over one to two weeks. Don’t panic if your rankings look odd mid-rollout. Check again once Google confirms the update is complete before drawing any conclusions.
2. Measure what actually changed
Look at your rankings and traffic before and after the update, and try to identify patterns:
- Which pages dropped? Which improved?
- Is the drop concentrated on certain topics or site sections?
- Did competitors who outranked you change anything recently?
Google Search Console is the obvious starting point. If you have a rank tracking tool, pull a before/after comparison.
One thing worth watching here: your overall clicks might be down, but that could be one high-traffic page dragging the average. Don’t rely on site-wide averages or the overall average position figure in GSC — it’s easy to look at a chart that’s dropped and assume everything is affected when the problem is actually concentrated on two or three pages. Go page by page and find out exactly where the movement happened.
3. Don’t make reactive changes
It’s tempting to start tweaking things the moment rankings drop. Resist this. Changes made during or immediately after an update are hard to evaluate because rankings are still settling. Make a list of things to investigate, but give it two to three weeks before acting.
When people do start investigating, the assumption is usually that the content is at fault. Sometimes it is. But core updates also recalibrate how much weight Google puts on authority signals, and if your rankings dropped across multiple pages rather than just one or two, that’s often a backlink problem, not a content problem. Your links may have become less valued relative to competitors who have been building authority in the meantime. In that case, rewriting pages won’t move the needle much. The fix is getting better links from sites that Google already trusts in your space.
4. Audit the content that dropped
For the specific pages that lost ground, ask honestly:
- Is this content genuinely useful, or is it just covering the topic?
- Is there a better, more thorough version of this page somewhere on the web?
- Does the page demonstrate real expertise, or does it just sound like it does?
- When was it last updated?
Google’s own guidance on core updates comes back to one question: would a user be satisfied with this page, or would they go back and click something else? That’s the right lens to use.
5. Look at who outranked you
If specific competitors moved up during the update, look at what they’re doing differently. Better content depth? More authoritative backlinks? A cleaner structure? Understanding what Google seemed to reward in your space is more useful than guessing.
6. Improve, don’t just tinker
Core update recoveries happen at the next core update, or sometimes the one after that. Google doesn’t re-evaluate your site in real time after every edit. So if you decide something needs work, do it properly rather than making surface-level changes hoping for a quick reversal.
What Google says to focus on
Google’s official guidance on recovering from core updates points to E-E-A-T: Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. The underlying idea is that Google is trying to figure out whether a page was written by someone who actually knows the topic, and whether users can trust it.
For most sites, that translates to practical things:
- Content depth. Does the page answer the question fully, or does it cover the surface and stop?
- Author credibility. Is it clear who wrote the content and why they’re qualified?
- Site trust signals. Are there clear contact details, a real about page, and accurate information throughout?
- User experience. Does the page load reasonably fast, work on mobile, and present information clearly?
None of these are new. Core updates just raise the bar on what “good enough” means.
How PrimaryRush approaches core updates
When a core update rolls out, the process here is methodical rather than reactive.
The first step is always the same: wait for the dust to settle, then measure. If a client’s site has taken a meaningful hit, it gets a proper content audit — not a quick rewrite, but an honest look at whether the affected pages are actually the best answer to the query, or whether they’re just present.
Most of the time, drops trace back to content that hasn’t kept pace with how the topic has evolved, or pages that are technically fine but lack the depth that the competition has since built. The fix is rarely technical. It’s usually a matter of doing more of the work.
The bigger thing to understand, though, is that core updates happen regularly. If a site goes through boom and bust cycles with every update, something is structurally off. A site with real authority — good links, consistent content, a clear topical focus — should absorb these updates without dramatic swings. The volatility itself is a signal worth paying attention to.
A few things that won’t help
A quick note on what not to do when a core update hits your site:
Don’t add content just to bulk up a page. More words don’t equal more quality. If a page is thin, it needs better information, not more paragraphs.
Don’t run a disavow campaign based on what a third-party tool flags as “toxic.” Most SEO tools flag links as toxic using their own scoring models, not Google’s. In practice, Google ignores many links that tools mark as problematic, and some of those same links can actually add authority. Disavowing them based on a tool’s say-so can do more harm than good. Disavow files have a real use case, but it’s narrow — clear, targeted spam or manual penalty situations, not a list generated by a dashboard.
Don’t rebuild your site architecture mid-volatility. If a redesign or migration was already planned, fine. But rebuilding in response to a core update adds noise and makes it harder to figure out what actually caused the change.
Don’t rely on SEO tools that claim to know Google’s algorithm. Nobody outside Google knows exactly what changed. Any tool promising to decode a core update is guessing.
Core updates are Google recalibrating its standards. The sites that do well over time are the ones that take the calibration seriously rather than looking for shortcuts around it.
If you’re working on a site that’s been affected by a recent update and want a second opinion on what might be driving it, that’s something PrimaryRush can help with.