Google rolled out its August 2024 core update on Thursday, August 15th. Shortly after, a significant search ranking bug emerged, leaving SEOs and site owners wondering how to distinguish between the two events. Google’s John Mueller emphasised that the full impact of the core update shouldn’t be assessed until the rollout is complete.
As many analyse the effects of the August 2024 core update, fluctuations in rankings have caused confusion—was it the core update or the ranking bug? Although the ranking bug was fully resolved yesterday, it’s crucial to allow more time before drawing conclusions. We recommend waiting until the end of this week to get a clearer picture of what’s happening.
While the core update is expected to roll out over the next few weeks, and Google has stated that the process will take about a month, the recent ranking bug complicates matters. You’ll need to monitor the data for another week or so to determine whether the changes you’re seeing are due to the core update, the ranking bug, or a combination of both. Keep in mind that the core update’s effects may still shift towards the end of the rollout, so things could still change.
So John Mueller of Google is not wrong when he commented on LinkedIn this morning:
He also clarified that this does not imply that you should wait to upgrade your website:
Then he referenced a lot of what he sees from SEOs on social media:
Later on in the comments he said:
So, while the ranking bug can be confusing, you are able to compare the week or two before the core update’s release to the week or two after it’s finished. I know everybody is nervous, and those that are should wait until next week to make comparisons.
Here’s a screenshot of John’s LinkedIn post:
