Google August 2024 Core Update: winners and losers
“Oops, Google did it again,” we might say paraphrasing Britney Spears. Once again this year, as is now “tradition,” the Search giant launched an algorithmic update in the middle of August, which disturbed or at least threatened the vacation season of SEOs and webmasters. In fact, the impact of this August 2024 Core Update does not seem to have been that violent, nor do the claims of Google, which had spoken of an intervention launched (also) to help sites that had lost rankings and traffic with previous updates, appear confirmed. Thanks to our SEOZoom Observatory, we analyzed quite a bit of data and sites: so here are our thoughts on the winners and losers of Google’s August 2024 Core Update.
Google’s August 2024 Core Update: the general information
Google’s August 2024 Core Update was launched on August 15, 2024 and officially ended on September 3, completing a rollout that lasted a total of 19 days.
Initially, Google’s announcement projected that the entire process could take up to a month, but it actually finished more quickly than expected, so that the update was completed in less than three weeks.
During this period, the search engine experienced the usual fluctuations in rankings, with a variable and sometimes unpredictable impact for different sectors, confirming how complex and articulated a core update of this magnitude can be. Despite the shorter timeline than originally expected, the update still left its mark on several sites, reconfiguring the dynamics of the SERPs.
What Google told us about the August 2024 update.
The update launched exactly on August Ferragosto is the second core update of 2024. As on previous occasions, Google’s public voices shared some information to clarify the purpose of the intervention and outline what the SEO industry should expect.
Since the launch, John Mueller, Search Advocate at Google, has provided details on the official blog and through the company’s social channels, explaining what prompted Google to release this update. In particular, he emphasized Google’s intention to make search results more useful for ordinary users. “This update,” Mueller said, ”is designed to continue our work to improve the quality of search results by showing more content that people actually find useful and less content that looks like it’s just made to achieve good performance on Search. With this sentence, Mueller highlighted one of the primary needs now entrenched in the Google ecosystem: balancing quality with accessibility of information.
So far, nothing particularly different or extraordinary compared to classic core updates-which serve precisely to improve the overall quality of search results by fine-tuning a sort of “general overhaul” of SERPs. But the August 2024 update was not a “normal” update: Google itself acknowledged that it had taken into consideration feedback received from the SEO community, particularly after the criticized Helpful Content update of September 2023, which had negatively impacted many small publishers and independent sites.
And so, precisely in response to criticism from smaller publishers and independent sites, which had seen significant drops in visibility in recent months despite offering good quality content, August 2024 Core Update was also designed to “give more space to smaller sites if they create useful and original content on relevant searches,” as stated by Mueller.
What were the effects of the August 2024 Core Update?
Like any core update, the August 2024 update left its mark on several domains globally, with both positive and negative impacts. This time, however, the update promised to push on a particular trend: ensuring a recovery of visibility for those small and independent publishers that had been overshadowed in previous years, often overtaken by larger entities or those more specialized in aggressive SEO techniques.
According to analysis by international experts, those negatively affected by the update were pages that merely exploited SEO mechanisms without offering real value to users, which saw a drop in their positions, confirming Google’s renewed focus on content quality. In particular, sites that rely on generic content, often drawn from unoriginal sources or without real expertise in the relevant industry, were among the most negatively affected.
As Rebekah Edwards analyzes on X, “August 2024 Core Update appears to have had a noticeable impact on those sites that did not offer a unique product or service”: the main losers were websites that did not feature their own products or add distinctive value over their competitors.
This is an important signal for those in the industry: simply being present is not enough; you need to offer something more.
On the other hand, the big beneficiaries of the update were those small publishers who, despite limited resources, continued to focus on the value of content, its usefulness and originality. Notably, some of the winners of this update had previously suffered significant declines with the Helpful Content Update of 2023. These sites have benefited from Google’s new approach, which seems to want to give a real second chance to those who have worked hard to improve their content offerings, demonstrating dedication and expertise.
Another interesting aspect is the gradual way in which this update has manifested its effects. During the first few days, some sites experienced an increase in visibility, only to experience a decrease in the second phase. This bipartite trend indicates a refinement process of the algorithm that further differentiated the authentically good sites from the more generic ones. In overall terms, however, the greatest impact was observed on sites that had not optimized their online presence according to Google’s recent guidelines-a warning to those who have not yet managed to align themselves with the principle of creating real value, and not simply following predetermined rules.
The sectors most affected by the August 2024 update
Broadening the frame of analysis, this update seems to have favored those sites that not only follow good SEO practices, but also put the quality, originality, and usefulness of their content at the center.
Through analysis of reactions from various sources in the industry, foreign experts have drawn a fairly clear picture of who has gained and who has lost in the battle of the SERPs.
Among the big winners we find, as mentioned, numerous small and independent publishers, many of whom had been challenged by previous updates. Sites specializing in niches, with strong expertise and dedication to the topics covered, saw a significant upswing. Interestingly, there is a growing consensus reported in many SEO communities about the benefits to domains that have been able to maintain a balanced mix of content designed for SEO and informative or experiential user-oriented content. This is particularly evident in the education, health, and wellness sectors, where small portals with high-quality original and editorial content have experienced a marked increase in visibility.
An emblematic example comes from one of the hardest hit sectors: e-commerce. Here, portals that also offer valuable content to support their products-for example, detailed buying guides or in-depth reviews-performed better than those that merely catalog products without adding real informational input. This suggests that Google intends to reward those sites that work not only to sell, but also to educate and help consumers in their choices.
Turning to the losers, sites that were demoted in the SERPs were often penalized for their apparent lack of uniqueness and value. In particular, portals with an impersonal approach or too many times focused on keyword stuffing and other outdated SEO tactics suffered major declines. A common case among the losers were sites that had failed to reinterpret their content strategy after the Helpful Content Update of 2023, continuing to focus on the old logic without adapting to the new quality standards required by Google.
Sectors such as tourism and travel blogging have also seen significant swings, with sites lacking recent updates or offering unoriginal experiences losing rankings to fresher platforms with more specific and detailed content.
SEOZoom’s analysis: how was August 2024 Google’s Core Update in Italy
But let’s delve deeper into the analysis of the effects of the August 2024 update on Google Italy, using SEOZoom data.
As we can see from the screenshots here, the impact has been quite strong from the very first days, particularly in terms of the frequency of changes both in the alternation between sites exiting and those instead entering the Google Top10 (Exits from TOP 10) and among the internal changes on the first page of Google, i.e., pages that change position while still remaining in the Top10 (1st Page Oscillations).
In fact, in both cases, we had peaks well above the historical average SERP values.
Also quite intense, at least in the initial phase, were the “Large Changes in SERPs,” i.e., the percentage of web pages that experienced large changes, either up or down.
In contrast, the frequency was more normal in “Small variations in SERPs,” where the values never went outside the average threshold.
The situation has gradually normalized by the end of August, and the swings have definitely slowed down their momentum.
The winners and losers of the Google update: the sites with the biggest changes
As on the occasion of the previous core update in March 2024 (launched at the same time as a spam update, it is worth remembering), we decided to deepen our analysis of the Italian SERPs to find out which sites benefited from this mid-August update or which ones lost rankings, and especially to see if we can detect a pattern in this algorithmic movement – in particular, with respect to the promise of “recovery” we mentioned.
In fact, once again we were faced with the impossibility of identifying the logic of Google’s action (but that was to be expected…): as we said in the very analysis of the effects of the March 2024 updates, it is not possible to find an actual correlation signal between winners or losers, just as it is not possible to do a simple check of sites by domain to see whether the gains of one domain match the losses of another, despite some overlapping themes between sites that win and those that lose rankings.
Small bit of methodology information: we queried our entire database to identify domains that had traffic changes in the period “straddling” the updates, but excluded activities unrelated to the updates-such as seasonality, “normal” surges for the type of site, effects of migrations, and so on. In addition, a subsequent check allowed us to further redefine the list to focus only on sites with at least 1,000 keywords placed on Google, so that the variation in traffic did not depend precisely on fluctuations of only a few keywords.
When we talk about variations in Zoom Authority, moreover, it is important to remember that our metric is calculated on a logarithmic scale: this means that each one-point increase does not represent a linear and constant variation, but rather an exponential change. Put in simpler terms: on a linear scale, a 1-point increase always means the same absolute increase, no matter what level you are at. For example, going from 10 to 11 is the same absolute increase (1 unit) than going from 50 to 51. On a logarithmic scale, each additional point implies an increase of one magnitude greater than the previous point: to go from value 10 to 11, the growth required is much less demanding than that required to go from value 90 to 91. A single point on a logarithmic scale covers a change of orders of magnitude greater as one moves upward. And so, even a one-point change in ZA for a site with a value of 85 has a decidedly large impact!
Anyway, here’s what we found out during our analysis of the Italian market.
- August 2024 Google Core Update, the sites that gained traffic and ranking
Among the sites that have seen an increase in traffic and ranking we find first of all La Stampa: the web version of the celebrated Turin newspaper has in fact increased its traffic value by 36% (which now exceeds 6 million) and its ZA by one point.
Looking at the keywords that are driving the project, we notice strong increases for broad keywords such as “lotto draws,” “italy,” and “ATM.”
Also doing very well is the Sorrisi website whose graph, which, despite some fluctuations, shows a nice rise. Today, the digital version of the well-known television magazine reaches an estimated traffic value of 16.7 million (it was below 15 million in early August) and a ZA of 78.
Turning to the food world , which is always very present in our surveys, there are at least two sites that have benefited from an increase in organic visibility.
The most striking case is casapappagallo, an editorial project of the well-known TV chef Luca Pappagallo, which more than doubled its visits (+123.91 in a few weeks), with ZA also jumping, now at 65 (it was 61 in July), thanks to excellent placements for industry-relevant kw.
Plus sign also for lacucinaitaliana, which was already among the winners of the previous Google update: the site is confirmed in the top 10 cooking sites in Italy and now boasts a traffic volume of almost 5 million, with ZA of 75.
Similar fate for humanitas: the health portal of the private, highly specialized polyclinic hospital in Rozzano continues to gain organic visibility and authority. Today it has an estimated traffic volume of 15,684,594, 7.7 percent more than indicated just a month ago, before the update.
- August 2024 Google Core Update, the sites that lost traffic and rankings
And let’s come to the sour notes, the sites that had the most significant slumps.
It certainly makes “noise” the loss of www.repubblica.it:-14.5 percent traffic and one ZA point between July and September for what is still one of Italy’s most popular and clicked information sites .
The decline of leroymerlin.it is also sustained: here we are faced with the loss of one million traffic in numerical value (-4.4%) and one ZA point.
After months of increases makes a minus sign fattoincasadabenedetta, a direct competitor of the cooking sites we mentioned earlier: Benedetta Rossi’s web project lost one million visits (-7.5 percent) and two positions in the industry rankings, drowned by the downgrading of several high-impact keywords.
It is interesting then what happens to the online dictionary industry: there are in fact at least three major sites that have lost rankings, but without a single competitor emerging distinctly as a winner.
Declining are the returns of www.wordreference.com, dictionaries.corriere.it (already penalized by the March update) and context.reverso.net (which, on the other hand, had increased in March).
- August 2024 Google Core Update, the sites that have recovered from the previous update
Of the sites cited in the analysis of the March update as the “losers,” only three actually reversed course in recent months and got an upward boost with the August update. These are the subdomain travel.thewom.co.uk, which goes against the general decline of the domain as a whole, deepl.com, and real estate.co.uk.
Analyzing the real estate agency’s website, we note that the ranking recovery actually started as early as May, although it is precisely after the update that values rose to levels never reached in the previous two years.
To date, real estate.co.uk boasts an estimated monthly traffic of 9,065,693, with over 872 thousand keywords placed and a ZA of 79, gaining one point over March.
As of mid-August, it appears that deepl.com has returned to Google’s favor after a long period of poor performance. In just a few days, the site of the well-known automated translator has gained an estimated 4 million traffic, with a two-point increase in ZA, which now reaches 75.
The third site that has shown signs of recovery is, as mentioned, travel.thewom: we are still a long way from the heights reached in March-when the traffic value was 1.5 million and the ZA 69-but we can still see tentative rises. Now, specifically, the estimated traffic is 494 thousand and the ZA has risen to 64.
As for ricettedalmondo, however, we are facing a different recovery: the decline of this site in fact began in April 2024 and has been steady, while with the August update the recovery seems to have started. In just a few days, the site has doubled its traffic volume, although it still remains below the threshold it reached in March 2024.
- August 2024 Google Core Update, the sites that have continued to lose out
Speaking of interesting trends, things seem to be going badly for some prominent sites that just can’t seem to get back into the good graces of Google’s algorithms.
This is the case of thewom, the Mondadori group’s “social magazine for the new generation of women,” which had taken a bad beating back in March: the August update brought the main site’s traffic to its lowest level in years – 1,131,297, less than half of March’s value, when it was 2,863,847, with concomitant loss of 3 ZA points in a few months.
Even more surprising is the decline of www.my-personaltrainer.it, which even though it remains the number 18 site overall in Italy (and number 1 for health): the March drop was followed by a period of fluctuations and a slight recovery, which, however, was again halted by the August update, which in fact caused a further drop in visits to 32,225,894. For reference, in February 2024 (only six/seven months ago!) the figure was 44,149,560, so we are talking about the loss of 27% traffic and one ZA point.
