Google & Reddit’s Love Affair: A Timeline Of The Search Partnership

Google and Reddit’s Relationship History

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June 2023 – Google upset after Reddit blackout causes search frustration

• During a Reddit boycott, thousands of subreddits went dark. But how does this affect Google? Plenty of searchers – myself included – regularly tag “reddit” at the end of queries to pull up relevant and genuinely useful content from the forum. Sadly, many were left unhappy and frustrated when this was no longer possible during the blackout.
• Google executives recognized the unrest, with more ads and spam filtering through the SERPs in place of Reddit results.

October 2023 – Reddit threatens to block Google

• Is it love or is it hate? Furthering tension between Google and Reddit, The Washington Post reported that Reddit threatened to block Google’s AI from crawling its site unless the company would be willing to pay for its data. With more people turning directly to Reddit instead of search engines for answers, Reddit’s single and ready to mingle.

15 November, 2023 – Google rolls out hidden gems algorithm update

• With the signs of love blossoming, Google rolled out an update to its search experience over a few months, formally announced in mid-November. This was separate from the usual core updates – instead, Google determined rankings for “hidden gem” content, such as forums (like Reddit), blog posts, social media posts, and similar channels.
• As a result, Google gave a real boost to Reddit’s threads and posts in the SERPs since they were deemed to be helpful to users.

February 22, 2024 – Google and Reddit sign AI content deal

• It’s official! With a $60 million per year deal, Google and Reddit announced a groundbreaking deal. This grants the search engine access to Reddit’s data, helping Google understand the content quickly and train its AI.
• Vice President of Google, Rajan Patel, announced the partnership in a blog post:

“Over the years, we’ve seen that people increasingly use Google to search for helpful content on Reddit to find product recommendations, travel advice and much more. We know people find this information useful, so we’re developing ways to make it even easier to access across Google products. This partnership will facilitate more content-forward displays of Reddit information that will make our products more helpful for our users and make it easier to participate in Reddit communities and conversations.”

May 2024 – Google tests Reddit snippet in search

• SEO professionals and publishers, such as Search Engine Land, reported Google testing unique Reddit snippets in search results. The element included familiar Reddit content, such as upvotes and the number of comments – it looked like a condensed version of a Reddit thread. I haven’t been able to find examples of this still in action following May, but it’s a clear sign of Google giving Reddit special treatment since this element hasn’t been tested with other forum sites, like Quora.

July 1, 2024 – Reddit blocks Bing and other search engines

• Reddit blocks major search engines, including Bing, from crawling the site after updating its robots.txt file. Google, however, hasn’t been prohibited and continues to show Reddit page results in the SERPs since the search engine pays for the privilege. Reddit has closed a similar deal with OpenAI for its search engine, SearchGPT.
• Is this to stay cozy with Google following the recent partnership? Is Reddit looking to strike similar deals with other search engines? Reddit spoke to The Verge in response to the claim:

“This is not at all related to our recent partnership with Google. We have been in discussions with multiple search engines. We have been unable to reach agreements with all of them, since some are unable or unwilling to make enforceable promises regarding their use of Reddit content, including their use for AI.”

• Reddit’s CEO, Steve Huffman, added to the conversation:

“Without these agreements, we don’t have any say or knowledge of how our data is displayed and what it’s used for, which has put us in a position now of blocking folks who haven’t been willing to come to terms with how we’d like our data to be used or not used.”

Will the Partnership Last?

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After following the relationship history from start to finish, it’s easy to say it’s been a rocky road for Google and Reddit. Things haven’t always been smooth-running, with hiccups and frustrations along the way. But, for now, it seems the two lovebirds are in a good place with the recent partnership.

Still, there’s trouble in paradise with plenty of SEO professionals voicing concerns over Reddit outranking original content or Reddit posts seeing immediate success in the SERPs. As of July 2024, Reddit is thriving as the fifth most visible domain in US organic search results – it was previously ranked 68th back in 2023. And, according to a report by Amsive, Reddit’s search visibility increased by 1,328% between July 2023 and April 2024. So, clearly Reddit is reaping the benefits while Google takes criticism from the public and professionals.

But, if the relationship wants to succeed in the long run, Google will need to address the wider issues.

I’ll keep this page updated with any new developments, but I also recommend subscribing to these popular SEO newsletters for expert commentary and updates.