Yesterday, December 26, Google announced it had finished rolling out what should be this year’s final spam update.
Google said the update would take seven days to complete, starting on December 19, 2024, and finishing on December 26, 2024.
Google announces spam update completion
The December spam update began one day after the December Core update finished rolling out. Google said the update was global and applied to all languages upon release.
- “Released the December 2024 spam update, which applies globally and to all languages. The rollout may take up to 1 week to complete.”
Google announced the rollout completion on its Search Status Dashboard:
Deindexing and deranking reports
Barry Shwartz, executive editor at Search Engine RoundTable, reports extensively on the effects the latest spam update is having, saying it looks more heated than the December core update, “it is wild.”
Shwartz wrote:
- “We are now a week into the spam update and look how much more heated these tools are compared to the December core update. It is wild.”
Shwarts also says many site owners report experiencing deindexing and deranking issues throughout the rollout. The consensus is the December 2024 spam update was a big one (possibly the biggest ever), broad and widespread, and not a link spam update.
Shwartz provides numerous screenshots of tracking tools backing that up.
Promoting more spam, not less
Google’s latest spam update couldn’t have come at a worse time for site owners, who rely on the festive period for crucial end-of-year traffic to compensate for what had already been a hugely volatile year caused by past core and spam updates.
It’s still unclear what policies the latest spam update targeted, but as Shwartz reports, many site owners and SEO professionals are saying so far, the update is promoting more spam, not less!
