Google Ads Text Guidelines Rolling Out To All In AI Max

Google Ads is rolling out text guidelines for all advertisers globally in AI Max. We thought the rollout started more broadly last October, after it was announced last September, but now it is really fully rolling out.

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Google Tests Web Mentions In Retailer Store Pages

Google is testing adding "web mentions" to the retailer store page under the reviews section. I cannot replicate this yet, but web mentions shows what people are saying about the retailer on sites like Reddit and other social platforms, whereas reviews are reviews left on Google.

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Bing Tests 2x2 Video Grid Layout

Microsoft Bing Search is testing a new layout for videos within the search results. Instead of a list view, Bing is testing a two-by-two grid layout.

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February 2026 Google Discover Core Update Is Done Rolling Out After 3 Weeks

Google's February 2026 Google Discover Core Update has officially completed rolling out after just over 3 weeks. This update started on February 5, 2026, and was completed on February 27, 2026.

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Google Post Reoccurring Scheduling Coming

Recently, Google rolled out the ability to schedule Google Posts. Supposedly, soon, Google will also roll out recurring scheduling for posts. So you can set a Google Post to repeat and post over and over again on a schedule.

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Google Search Brief Serving Issue This Morning

Google had a brief issue with serving search results this morning, February 25th. Google documented the issue at around 1:30 am ET on Wednesday, February 25th and said it was resolved a minute later.

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Microsoft Advertising Tests Shopping Carousel With Multiple Images Toggle

Microsoft Advertising is testing an update to the shopping ads carousel that can show multiple images in a single card. Essentially, you are seeing a carousel within a carousel for Bing shopping ads.

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Bing Updates Shopping Ads Design

Microsoft Advertising seems to be testing a new design for the Bing shopping ads carousel. The new design fills the screen more from left to right than the old design and is just wider in general.

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Google Search Console Page Indexing Report Missing A Chunk Of Data

The Google Search Console page indexing report seems to be missing a chunk of data. The missing data is from December 15th and earlier, but we do have data from December 15th (14th) through today.

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Google Search Ranking Volatility Beginning To Cool?

Some are wondering when the Google Search ranking volatility will begin to cool down a bit. While many of the tools continue to show heated volatility over the past weeks, some are starting to show signs of cooling.

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ChatGPT Ads From Expedia Spotted In The Wild

As you know, OpenAI said they would release ads in ChatGPT and then about ten days ago, said the ads went live for a limited number of users. Since then, we have not seen reports of anyone seeing ads in the wild within ChatGPT until now.

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Google Sponsored Places Search Ad Unit

Google may be testing a new ad unit named Sponsored Places. I think this is new, I mean, have any of you seen this before in the search results? Instead of it saying "Sponsored results" or a local pack with sponsored listings.

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Google Ads Updates Certification Process For Cryptocurrency

Google is rolling out an update for Google Ads advertisers to certify for some cryptocurrency and complex speculative financial products. This is "incrementally to all advertisers over a period of time and not all advertisers and certification applications will be affected immediately," Google wrote.

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Google AdSense Anchor & Vignette Ads Bug Won't Close Ads

There is a bug impacting a number of Google AdSense publishers where the anchor and vignette ads won't close for users. This has been an issue since February 13th and Google is reportedly working on a fix for the issue.

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Google AI Overviews Have Blue Links Before Click & Gray After Click

Did you know that the Google AI Overviews link citation paperclip icons are blue before you click to see more of the overviews and then after you click on them, that icon turns to a gray color.

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Google Ends Parked Domains (AFD) On Search Partner Network

Google AdSense has ended its Parked Domains (AFD) as an ad surface within the Search Partner Network effective February 10, 2026. Google wrote, "Parked Domains (AFD) will cease to be an ad surface within the Search Partner Network effective February 10, 2026."

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Google Search Ranking Volatility Remains Heated Through The Weekend

On February 10th, we reported the beginning of yet another unconfirmed Google Search ranking update. The volatility has not cooled yet and it seems it may have even heated up through the weekend.

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Bing Tests Underlining Name & Price In Shopping Ads Carousel

Microsoft is testing underlining the product name and product price in the shopping ads carousel at the top of the Bing Search results. I am not sure how much this adds to the interface but maybe it drives a bit more attention and thus clicks?

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Google AI Mode Launches UCP-Powered Checkout

Google is rolling out UCP, Universal Commerce Protocol, powered checkout in AI Mode. This launched as part of the Google Ads news from yesterday, and you can now see it in AI Mode for products from Etsy and Wayfair.

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Google AdSense Adds New Triggers For Vignette Ads

Google AdSense has added additional triggers for vignette ads. There are now a total of six triggers, three old ones and three new ones. These new triggers took effect on February 9, 2026.

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Google Ads New AI Mode Shopping Ad & Veo 3 Is In Asset Studio

Google announced a new ad unit for AI Mode for shopping ads which promotes retailers. Google also launched Veo 3 support in Google Ads Asset Studio. Plus Vidhya Srinivasan, VP/GM of Ads & Commerce at Google, published her annual letter to the industry on the Google blog.

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Google Releases Early Preview Of WebMCP

The Google Chrome team announced its early preview of WebMCP, "a standard way for exposing structured tools, ensuring AI agents can perform actions on your side with increased speed, reliability, and precision," André Cipriani Bandarra from Google wrote.

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Google Clarifies Google's Crawler File Size Limits Doc Again

Earlier this month, we reported that Google updated two of its help documents around Google's crawler file size limits. Well, Google made a clarification to one of those documents the other day after some confusion within the SEO industry.

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Google Business Short Names Being Removed From Business Profiles

Google will stop showing the business short names on Google Business Profiles in Search and Google Maps. The short name will still work, if you have one, but going forward, the link in your Google Business Profile will no longer be displayed to you or searchers.

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Grokipedia Seeing Decline In Google Search Visibility

There are some reports coming out that Grokipedia, the AI-based Wikipedia, is now showing a decline in search visibility in both Google and even ChatGPT. This comes after both an indexing and ranking surge in Google Search.

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OpenAI ChatGPT Ads Go Live With User Ad Controls

OpenAI has officially launched ads in ChatGPT yesterday. The company announced, "Today, we're beginning to test ads in ChatGPT in the U.S. The test will be for logged-in adult users on the Free and Go subscription tiers. Plus, Pro, Business, Enterprise, and Education tiers will not have ads."

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Google AI Mode Tests Citation Icons At Bottom Of Answers

Google appears to be testing showing the citation favicon site icons at the bottom of the answer in AI Mode. This is in addition to where it normally shows those icons, at the top right of the card stack, on the side of the answer response.

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Bing Tests Dynamic Results Count Under Search Box

Microsoft Bing is testing a dynamically loading results count under the search box. So when you enter your search phrase, the results count will dynamically count up from 0 to the number of results found.

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Google AI Overviews Tests Contextual Overlay Link Cards

Over the past week or so, Google has been testing a new format for link cards in the AI Overviews within Google Search. When you place your mouse cursor over a link clip icon, a new overlay will show you the page/site cards that line of text is being sourced from.

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Reddit On Google & ChatGPT AI Responses Citations & Lack Of Links

On the Reddit Q4 2025 Earnings Call (see transcript here), Steve Huffman, the CEO of Reddit, was asked about how he feels about how Google and OpenAI link or use citations to link to Reddit's content. Overall, Steve made it sound like the interfaces are adapting quickly and he is hopeful they will drive traffic to the conversation (within Reddit) in the future.

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Report: ChatGPT & Perplexity Treat Structured Data As Text On A Page

To fuel the debate in the SEO world of the topic of structured data and LLMs and AI engines, we are hearing that once again, AI engines like ChatGPT and Perplexity are not using structured data in any special way.

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February 2026 Google Discover Core Update Rolling Out - Local Impact

Google has released its first core update of 2026, which is focused on just Google Discover. Google named it the February 2026 Discover core update. This one is rolling over the next two weeks or so just English language users in the US and at some point will roll out beyond that to all countries and languages.

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Microsoft Advertising Tests Magazine Answer Card Ad Format

Microsoft Advertising is testing a new ad format within its newish Answer Card format called a magazine layout. These load ads in the card formats you see at the top of some of the Bing search results.

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Google AI Overviews Bug Removes Links & Citations

Google confirmed there is a bug with AI Overviews not showing links for some responses. The bug was spotted by Lily Ray, who posted some examples several hours ago. Rajan Patel, Google's VP, Engineering for Search, replied saying it is a bug and Google is working on fixing it.

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Google Ad Revenue Up 14% - Google's Biggest Revenue & Ad Revenue Yet

Google reported its earnings today, its Q4 2025 earnings report showed ad revenues up by 14% at $82.3 billion and overall revenue was up 17% at $113.8 billion. I specifically like to dig in as best as I can on the ad revenue side to see how Google Ads have performed.

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Googlebot File Limit Is 15MB But 64MB For PDF & 2MB For Other File Types

We have known for a long time that Google can crawl web pages up to the first 15MB but now Google updated some of its help documentation to clarify that it will crawl the first 64MB of a PDF file and the first 2MB of other supported file types.

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Google's First 2026 Winter Olympics Doodle: Curling

Google posted its first Winter Olympics Doodle, special logo, for the 2026 Winter Olympics. The first sport Google covered is curling. The Doodle is an animated GIF of an Olympian pushing the curling stone down the ice.

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Google: Don't Spend Too Much Time On Redirects Analysis For SEO

Google's John Mueller said he would "caution against assuming that you need to do this level of analysis for all URLs on a website in order to achieve optimal SEO" when it comes to reviewing bad redirects or CSP settings. Why, because bad redirects or CSP settings are often simply visible when doing normal browsing, and if you see it, then that is enough.

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February 2026 Google Webmaster Report

Welcome to the Google Webmaster report, where I sum up all the more important Google organic search topics that occurred over the past month - just in case you (or I) missed it. January was an incredibly volatile month regarding unconfirmed Google search ranking movement. I posted about it several times.

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One Click Google Ads Performance Max Ad Previews

Google Ads has this new way to preview your Performance Max campaign ads, with one click. Now you can easily preview your PMax asset group ads from the table by clicking on the images.

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Google Ads Advertiser Verification Page Moving

Google is moving the Google Ads verification page to a new section within the Google Ads console. It is moving to the Admin, then Policy and Account section.

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Google Personal Intelligence Creates AI Frankenstein Recipes

We covered the topic of Google's AI Frankenstein recipes and how bad it is for recipe bloggers and publishers. But when you have Google's Personal Intelligence serve up these Frankenstein chunks of content, it makes it so much worse.

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Google Ads API Version 23 Now Available

Google has released version 23 of the Google Ads API, this is a major release with dozens of updates. Updates include Performance Max reporting data with Ad Network type breakdown, more incentives, reporting and conversion controls - plus much more.

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Bing Ads Revenue Up 10% - Is Growth Slowing?

Microsoft reported its second quarter 2026 earnings and it showed that its search and advertising revenue was up for 10% but growth is down over the past two quarters. The previous quarter it was up 16% and the one before that was 21% and this quarter, it is only up 10%.

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Bad News: Google AI Overviews Follow-Up Questions Go Directly To AI Mode

Google made it official, now Google Search AI Overviews will let you do a follow up question after clicking on the "Show more" button and that follow up question will take you directly into AI Mode. This will no doubt lead to less clicks to your website and more traffic into Google AI Mode.

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Bing Webmaster Tools AI Performance Report Beta

Bing is testing a new report within Bing Webmaster Tools named AI Performance. AI Performance shows you how many citations you are getting from Microsoft Copilot and partners. But while it shows you citations (i.e. impressions), it does not show you clicks from those Bing AI experiences.

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Google Exploring Ways To Allow Sites To Opt Out Of AI Overviews & AI Mode

Google just announced it is looking into ways to allow websites to specifically opt out of Google using its content in the Search generative AI features such as AI Overviews and AI Mode. This comes based on UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) new requirements for Google Search.

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Google Ads Data Exclusions For PMax Campaigns Rolling Out

Back in October, we saw signs of the ability to use data exclusions on Google Ads Performance Max (PMax) campaigns. Well, now it seems to be rolling out to many advertisers on Google Ads.

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Microsoft Advertising Launches Ad Preview Hub

Microsoft Advertising has fully released the Microsoft Advertising Ad Preview Hub to all users. "I am beyond excited about Microsoft Advertising's new Ad Preview Hub! This is GA and should be live in your accounts in all markets," Navah Hopkins, the Microsoft Ads Liaison, wrote on LinkedIn.

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Google Ads Product Campaign View Report Is Useful

Google Ads lets you see how your product ads are performing across all your campaigns in a single view. Some advertisers are saying this is a new report, so I figured I'd share what they're noticing.

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Secure Your Google Ads Account Against The Rise In Hijackings

For the past year or so, I've seen a growing number of complaints about Google Ads accounts being hijacked. It seems to be getting worse, even after we covered the Google Ads account hijacks last November. So how do you reduce the chances of your Google Ads account being hijacked?

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Apple Releasing Two New Siri; iOS 26.4 & iOS 27 (Campos, Rave & Fizz)

Apple will reportedly release two new Siri versions, one this year with iOS 26.4 and one next year with iOS 27. Plus, Apple may release an AI pin wearable device in 2027.

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OpenAI To Charge Based On Ad View Impressions, Not Clicks

As you know, OpenAI will soon show ads on ChatGPT, but now we are hearing that those ads will be charged on a pay-per-view, impression-based model, not a click-based, cost-per-click model.

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Google Search Makes Recipe Results More Publisher Friendly

A few weeks ago, we covered how damaging the Google Search results were for recipe publishers and bloggers. It was nicknamed Frankenstein recipes because it would take pieces of these recipes from bloggers, mash them together and ruin them, all while also mentioning the brand name - hurting the brand.

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New GoogleBot: Google Messages

Google added a new crawler, robot, to its list of user-triggered fetchers in the Google crawlers documentation. This specific bot is named Google Messages and it is a fetcher "used to generate link previews for URLs sent in chat messages," Google wrote.

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Google Search Monopoly Appeal Legal Docs Mention Search Signals

As you know, Google has appealed its search monopoly ruling and with that, filed a number of new documents with the court. One is an affidavit of Elizabeth Reid, Google's Vice President and Head of Search. The other is of Jesse Adkins Director of Product Management for Search Syndication and Search Ads Syndication.

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Daily Search Forum Recap: January 20, 2026

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today...

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Google AI Mode Shows Product Inventory & Pricing In Light Font Color

Google AI Mode is showing really light colored fonts for product pricing and inventory when you click on a product. This differs from the normal font type in the main Google Search results interface.

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Google: Comments Link Spam Has No Effect On SEO/Search

Google's John Mueller said that link spam left in the comments section have no effect on Google Search or SEO, (and maybe even your website's performance in Google Search?). He wrote on Bluesky, "These links all have no effect - they're from spammers dropping links into comments. These would not have any effect, positive nor negative, on your site."

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Google Ads A/B Tests Product Titles & Images For Shopping Ads

Google Ads is doing a limited test with some advertisers to allow them to run A/B tests with different product titles and images in Shopping Ads. Ginny Marvin, the Google Ads Liaison, said it is "currently being tested with a small number of merchants."

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Google's John Mueller Says Universal Commerce Protocol Won't Kill SEO

Earlier this week, Google announced Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) and it has a lot of the industry worried. Once SEO named Ramon Eijkemans said, "I hate to bring this, but SEOs: we're gonna be f$@*ed." John Mueller from Google responded on Bluesky and said, "I disagree."

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Google Trends Explore Page Adds Gemini

Google has added Gemini to the Google Trends Explore page to help you find new and fresh search terms. It will also compare those search terms automatically for you, all in a new design. This is rolling out now, but you might not see it just yet.

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Microsoft Advertising Releases Guide To AEO & GEO

The Microsoft Advertising team released a new PDF guide named "From discovery to influence: AEO A guide to and GEO." This guide offers "Practical data strategies to empower retailers for AI search, AI assistants and AI browsers."

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Daily Search Forum Recap: January 13, 2026

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today...

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Google Hotel Knowledge Panels Posting Currently Turned Off Bug

Google seems to have a bug that prevents searchers from leaving hotel reviews directly in the Google Search desktop interface. It works fine within Google Maps and Hotel search interfaces but not in the web search interface.

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Google Ads Brand Linking Experiment

Google Ads seems to be slowly rolling out a new Google Ads experimental feature in the Google Ads Lab section named Brand Linking. Brand linking lets you "Link customers to brands," it reads.

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Microsoft Advertising Reminds Advertisers To Configure Email Settings

Navah Hopkins, the Microsoft Ads Liaison, posted a reminder on LinkedIn, encouraging advertisers to ensure the email settings are all configured properly. You can get monthly invoices, billing alerts, account notifications, ad and keyword rejection notices, optimization and performance tips and more.

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Google Vehicle Ads Gains Call Assets

Google seems to be testing showing call assets on Vehicle Ads within Google Search. So on the Vehicle Ads there is a way to call the dealer or seller, like you see on some other ads.

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Google Hiring Search Intelligence Chief of Staff

Google is hiring a Chief of Staff on Search Intelligence, Strategy and Operations. This job is to "help architect the next era of Search with AI," Rajan Patel, the Vice President of Search Engineering of Google, posted on LinkedIn.

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Google Ads To Allow Ads For Prediction Markets

Google Ads will update its advertising policies to allow ads for Prediction Markets starting on January 21, 2026. This will be allowed in the United States, but only for federally regulated entities.

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Google Ads Change History Adds Go To Button

Google added a new button to the Google Ads Change history report that lets advertisers quickly jump to different campaigns and ad groups in this report. It should be a big time saver for some advertisers.

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Google Search Tests Blue Send Button In Query Box

Google is testing a blue "Send" button in the search query box on its home page. When you type in your query, you can click "Send" to search Google for that query.

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John Mueller (Personally) On If Schema Helps With LLMs & Google

John Mueller, who works on the Google Search team, responded to a question that asks, "Does extensive Schema markup actually help Large Language Models (LLMs) understand your entity better, or is it just for Google Rich Snippets?" He responded to the question, prefacing it that it is his point of view and "this is not official guidance."

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Google's John Mueller Working On New Year's Day (2026 Edition)

Just like with Christmas day every year, so to with New Year's Day - Google's John Mueller and often other Googlers, are out and looking to respond to some questions on Google Search and SEO. John Mueller so far posted a few times on Reddit this morning, January 1, 2026.

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Google Displays New Year's Eve Doodle On New Year's Day

This is weird. It is 2026, and Google.com, the Google Search home page, is still showing yesterday's New Year's Eve doodle of 2025 going into 2026. But it is after 7 am ET here on January 1, 2026, and on all my devices, I see yesterday's Google Doodle.

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