Google launches its third spam update of the year: this is what you can expect from it

Google often uses the summer to make changes to its recommendation algorithm system, whether through full-scale revisions via a core update or through more targeted adjustments, such as the new spam update it has just rolled out.

And yes, if it sounds familiar, that is perfectly normal. It is the third update of this kind so far in 2026, following those in March and June.

Google takes aim at bad SEO practices

These types of updates are designed to identify and reduce the visibility of websites that rely on bad SEO practices to manipulate search results in their favor. Some examples? Showing different content to users and search engines in order to manipulate rankings, reusing reputable domains to publish irrelevant content, overloading content with keywords (so-called “keyword stuffing”), or even techniques that are directly dangerous for end users, such as code injection.

As the company itself explains, “Although Google’s automated systems for detecting search spam operate continuously, we sometimes make notable improvements to them (…) For example, SpamBrain is our AI-based spam prevention system. From time to time, we improve that system so that it becomes more effective at detecting spam and making sure it recognizes new types of spam.”

In this case, Google has not provided any further details about it, other than the fact that it will take “a few days” to complete and will be applied globally, across all languages.

How should you respond to a spam update?

I am afraid that, as is often the case with Google’s other algorithm updates, there is not much you can do for now.

The idea is for this spam update to penalize those who violate Google’s policies, so if you have not done anything wrong, you should not worry. The only thing that might happen is that Google pushes your competitors down in its search results and, as a result, you climb a few spots in the SERPs. Beyond that, these updates are more about the groundwork done before they arrive.

In other words, doing things the right way.

And if you have not done everything as you should have (whether out of ignorance or intentionally), you will notice it once the update process is complete, in a few days. If you then see that you have lost positions for some keywords, or notice a major drop in traffic overall, it will be time to focus on making changes and getting ahead of the next spam update.

Because there will be one.

In fact, Google itself explains that “if you see a change on your site after a spam update, review our spam policies to make sure you are complying with them. Sites that violate our policies may rank lower in results or not appear in them at all. Making changes can help a site improve its ranking if our automated systems observe over the course of several months that the site complies with our spam policies.”

(Hang in there!)

Image: ChatGPT