Google seems to be showing fewer FAQ snippets for many sites starting on April 5th. Over the holidays, I received several questions about this but didn’t have time to write it up until now. But while the tracking tools show no decline in FAQ snippets, many SEOs report drops in FAQ snippets for some sites they monitor.
The reports are visible in the Google Search Console performance report, when you filter by the FAQ rich results search appearance. Then if you toggle to see just mobile results, the results are even more shocking.
Here are some charts that Glenn Gabe shared on Twitter:
Glenn said, “I’m seeing a massive drop in FAQ snippets across websites starting on 4/5. When filtering by device, it’s almost all mobile. Checking the SERPs yields no FAQ snippets for those listings on mobile anymore. So something seems to have changed that day.”
Here are more:
Seeing the same thing – starting 4/5 and mobile pic.twitter.com/yNWip56JHw
— Emily Yetzer 🌈 (@EmilyYetzer) April 13, 2023
Seeing the same thing – starting 4/5 and mobile pic.twitter.com/yNWip56JHw
Oh man, yeah that looks even worse! pic.twitter.com/bGUWMh1AKI
— Tony Hill (@tonythill) April 13, 2023
Oh man, yeah that looks even worse! pic.twitter.com/bGUWMh1AKI
So RankRanger does indeed show a drop in FAQs on that date:
Go ahead, check sites that have FAQ rich results and see in Search Console if you see a huge drop in that number for mobile.
These sites did lose their FAQ snippets in the mobile Google search results.
Forum discussion at Twitter.
Update May 8th: This is now happening on desktop, not just mobile, search results:
And to clarify, the FAQ snippets that were removed from mobile on 4/5 had remained for those listings on desktop. Those are the ones removed from desktop now. This means the sites impacted are seeing a massive drop in FAQ snippets on both mobile & desktop now. Started on 5/4… pic.twitter.com/RXR5Ld3R4I
— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) May 8, 2023
And to clarify, the FAQ snippets that were removed from mobile on 4/5 had remained for those listings on desktop. Those are the ones removed from desktop now. This means the sites impacted are seeing a massive drop in FAQ snippets on both mobile & desktop now. Started on 5/4… pic.twitter.com/RXR5Ld3R4I
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