Google Will Again Prioritize Faster Sites in Mobile Search

Google is once again pushing faster sites in search. The search engine giant announced today that it will be releasing a new Speed Update for Google Search on mobile devices to prioritize faster sites this July. Google has already been using speed statistics to rank websites on search, but the current algorithm is apparently only focused on desktop searches.

With the new Speed Update, faster sites will get better ranking on mobile search, and Google says the update will “only affect pages that deliver the slowest experience to users.” Google claims it still won’t penalise a page only based on its performance, so it will continue to use content quality, and other important variables when ranking sites on mobile search.

Google has been pushing faster websites in Search for a long while now. The changes are more noticeable on mobile devices, where the company started using a wide range of indicators to prioritize sites that are mobile friendly and have fast load times. One example of that is the company’s controversial Accelerate Mobile Pages (AMP) project, which places sites with AMP support in front of everyone else on search. Shockingly, people aren’t too happy with Google’s current approach towards providing users with a faster mobile web.