Freshness Signals.

Freshness signals are the data points Google uses to determine how recent or up-to-date a piece of content is. These include the date a page was first discovered, the date it was last substantively modified, the frequency of updates, and signals from external sources linking to content after it was published.

Query Deserves Freshness (QDF)

Google's Query Deserves Freshness (QDF) algorithm identifies queries where recency is important—breaking news, recurring events, and rapidly changing topics—and boosts recently published or updated content for those queries. QDF has less effect on evergreen informational queries where accuracy and comprehensiveness outweigh recency.

Signals Google Uses to Assess Freshness

Key freshness signals include: the date shown in structured data (datePublished, dateModified), the sitemap lastmod date, the crawl date Google assigns when Googlebot first discovers an update, the date embedded in the URL (e.g., /2025/), and the publication date extracted from page text or bylines. Substantive content changes—not just metadata date updates—are required for freshness boosts on competitive queries.