Structured Data Change History & Alerts

The MerchantReturnPolicy structured data documentation has been updated to clarify that return policies for specific products that override the standard return policy should be specified by using MerchantReturnPolicy under the Offer type. Merchant-level return policies must be defined under Organization markup.

Return policies for individual products specified under Offer support a more limited set of properties. These are outlined in the Merchant listing documentation, which has also been updated.

The MemberProgram structured data documentation has been updated to clarify that loyalty benefits for individual products should be specified by listing UnitPriceSpecification markup under Offer structured data markup. Business-level loyalty programs can be specified using the MemberProgram structured data type nested under the Organization structured data type.

Merchant listings documentation has been updated to reflect these recommendations.

The new Loyalty program documentation has been updated to specify that the feature is available in Google Search results in Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Mexico, the UK, and the US, on both desktop and mobile.

Google has announced it is phasing out support for a number of Structured Data features. These types of markup will no longer provide visual enhancements in search results. 

The following features are no longer supported:

• Book Actions
• Course Info
• Claim Review
• Estimated Salary
• Learning Video
• Special Announcement
• Vehicle Listing

This is part of an ongoing effort to simplify the Google Search results page and focus on other, more widely used experiences.

This update won't affect how pages are ranked.

The Merchant return policy documentation was migrated from the Organization documentation to a new, separate page.

Google now supports Loyalty program markup in Search. New documentation was added for loyalty programs.

Google’s Recipe Schema Markup documentation was updated with a clarification that the image property in Recipe structured data is only used for recipe rich results, and it does not influence the image that's chosen as a text result image.

To optimize for a text result image, Google recommends following the image SEO best practices.

Google has removed online event properties and references to online events from their Event documentation. 

The content guidelines section was also updated with examples that specify types of ineligible events, including:

• Events that are not bookable to the general public
• Events where the primary participants and audience are minors and occur on school premises
• Virtual experiences and events without a physical location.

Google updated the merchant listing documentation relating to energy efficiency. The update removed the EnergyConsumptionDetails properties, added a note regarding backwards compatibility for developers who implemented the original markup, and provided an alternative solution for the certificationIdentification property for merchants without EPREL codes.

This follows the announcement made in October 2024 that the EnergyConsumptionDetails type would be replaced by the more robust Certification type.

Google has announced that the Special announcement search feature will be deprecated on July 31, 2025. This rich result was brought in originally to help organizations with urgent announcements surrounding COVID-19.

Google has updated the Education Q&A documentation to confirm that the education Q&A carousel is now available in Portuguese in all regions where Google Search is available. 

This comes just a couple of weeks after the education Q&A documentation was updated to include Spanish (Mexico) and Vietnamese (all regions where Google Search is available).

Google has removed a mention of the ‘AI tools while browsing’ feature from the subscription and paywalled content documentation.

Google's update confirms that the AI while browsing feature is no longer available.

New and updated vocabulary in the area of financial incentives, legislation, and product shipping. Various build and documentation fixes.

• Added vocabulary to represent financial incentives, for example in the area of sustainability: Added new type FinancialIncentive. Added new properties for use on FinancialIncentive. 
• Added new properties for use on Legislation to include changes to the European Legislation Identifier (ELI) model.
• Enhanced shipping vocabulary: Deprecated DeliveryTimeSettings and superseded by new ShippingConditions. Added existing properties for use on ShippingConditions. Added new properties for use on ShippingConditions. Added shippingConditions with range ShippingConditions. Added fulfillmentType with a range of new enumeration FulfillmentTypeEnumeration. Added ShippingService with properties fulfillmentType, handlingTime , validForMemberTier, and shippingConditions. Added hasShippingService with range ShippingService for use on Organization and OfferShippingDetails. Added ServicePeriod with existing properties duration, cutoffTime, and businessDays for use as additional range for handlingTime and transitTime. Added orderPercentage and weightPercentage for use on ShippingRateSettings. Added Mass to the range of weight. Deprecated: shippingSettingsLink, shippingLabel, and transitTimeLabel.
• Added new property aggregateElement for use on ItemList to allow capturing of aggregate information of list items.
• Corrected definition for netWorth.
• Added wordCount for use on CreativeWork.
• Build and documentation fixes and cleanups.

Google has updated the Education Q&A documentation to confirm that the education Q&A carousel is now available in more languages and regions. The results are now available in Spanish (Mexico) and Vietnamese (all regions where Google Search is available).

Google updated the documentation for Merchant listings to include an example for returnPolicyCountry, since this is a required property for MerchantReturnPolicy.

Google has simplified how breadcrumb structured data is used in Search. Breadcrumb rich results will no longer appear on mobile devices and will only be available on desktop. This change aims to streamline mobile search results while maintaining desktop functionality.

Google updated the Review snippet rich result documentation, adding a recommendation about accepting ratings and reviews. They recommend implementing a setup that only accepts ratings and reviews that are accompanied by a review comment and author's name, as this approach can help your users understand the context for a given rating.

Google updated the Image metadata documentation to include information on how they extract C2PA metadata for use in Search. If an image contains C2PA metadata, Google can extract those details and may show information in the "About this image" feature, such as how the image was created or if it was edited with AI tools.

Google have updated the Merchant listing documentation to add Certification markup support. They also announced that, starting in April 2025, they're replacing the EnergyConsumptionDetails type with the more robust Certification type, as the new type supports more countries and a broader scope of certifications.

Google added the priceType property to the merchant listing documentation, to make it easier for merchants to specify sale pricing through structured data and bring parity with price features in Merchant Center. Also added new sale pricing examples.

Added support for member programs, and various build improvements:

• Added support for loyalty programs through new classes MemberProgram, MemberProgramTier, and enumeration TierBenefitEnumeration. Also added properties isTierOf, hasTiers, hasMemberProgram, program, hasTierBenefit, and validForMemberTier.
• Added new enumeration value RegularPrice for enumeration PriceTypeEnumeration.
• Added new enumeration values Reserved and MadeToOrder for enumeration ItemAvailability.
• Fixed documentation for duration, which must be specified in ISO 8601 duration format.
• Cleaned up PaymentMethod class.
• Removed non-existing link to count under statType.
• Added Organization to range of founder.

Google updated their documentation to add a new recommended property of ineligibleRegion, which allows you to specify a region where the video isn't allowed (if applicable). If not specified, then Google assumes the video is allowed everywhere.

Note that Google also supports the regionsAllowed property, and suggests you add either ineligibleRegion or regionsAllowed, whichever makes sense for your site.

You can embed IPTC photo metadata directly inside an image, and Google will extract the recommended property Digital Source Type. They ar now able to extract the IPTC NewsCode of compositeWithTrainedAlgorithmicMedia (The image is a composite of trained algorithmic media with some other media, such as with inpainting or outpainting operations).

Google updated their documentation, adding MerchantReturnPolicy to allow organizations to specify a general return policy for an Organization as a whole.

Google removed the search feature for Home Activities, which no longer appears in Google Search results. The Home Activities rich result was designed to help people discover activities that they can do from home - for example for upcoming video livestreams or online events.