Google Core Update in June 2025 brought long-awaited relief for some publishers—boosting traffic and rankings, while others saw little change or further decline. In this post, we break down what shifted, who recovered, and how to adapt for sustainable growth.
Google’s core updates have ranged from disruptive to subtle, but none can be ignored. Since March 2023, the search results have shifted considerably, with publishers feeling the impact. Announced on June 30th, the Google June 2025 core update was completed on July 17, 2025.
The rollout of this update lasted 16 days, and it didn’t go unnoticed. Several Data providers, namely Similarweb, SEMRush, Sistrix, and others, flagged it as one of the bigger updates in recent history. Many sites saw ranking fluctuations not just during the update, but even a few days before and after it officially rolled out.
Whether your site experienced a traffic surge, a considerable drop, or puzzling fluctuations after the latest update, this guide will walk you through the essential steps publishers/bloggers need to take.
What Happened After Google Core Update June 2025?
After nearly two years of suppressed visibility, many publisher websites are finally seeing a turnaround.
Websites that took a hit from the September 2023 Core Update (Helpful Content Update), and earlier Reviews updates, are now showing significant signs of recovery post Google June 2025 Core Update.
For publishers impacted by the 2023 Helpful Content Update, the bounce-back may still be modest compared to their former visibility.
However, after years of struggling to regain organic traction, any upward movement feels like a breakthrough.
Over the past two years, Google has repeatedly acknowledged the challenges faced by independent publishers and hinted at future updates designed to address these issues.
In fact, Danny Sullivan (Google’s public Search Liaison) previously pointed to December 2025 as the target by which publishers could expect improvement. With the recent uptick in rankings and visibility, it seems that recovery may have arrived ahead of schedule and for many in publishing, it couldn’t come soon enough.
Not all websites witnessed an upward trend in their rankings or traffic. In fact, some experienced a devastating affect with their traffic dropping down. Moreover, many websites have not reported any changes at all. They experienced the exact same rankings and traffic.
- Consecutive Google Core Updates starting from 2023 have negatively impacted publishers and bloggers globally.
- The June 2025 Core Update marked a turning point by offering some relief to organic traffic trends.
- Although recovery has started, it has been partial and inconsistent across the board.
- Some publishers experienced traffic boosts of up to 80%, others around 20%, and some saw no changes at all.
Google Core Update Impact Calculator
Here’s a calculator to help you measure how much your website was impacted by Google’s June 2025 Core Update.
How to Assess the Impact of a Google Core Update?
Whenever an update rollout is complete, publishers/bloggers should check for certain parameters that might or might have not affected their organic efforts.
Here’s what to look for:
Ranking fluctuations: With a 15-day gap of pre and post update completion, check if the new updates has impacted ranking of your website pages on SERP.
Traffic Changes: Analyze traffic data for any anomalies post-update. A downward trend may indicate that your site no longer aligns with the revised algorithm, which indicates it’s high time to make changes following the Google update.
Industry’s Performance: Another practice to follow is analyzing whether the update extended industry-wide. Check whether the impact of the update was isolated to your site or felt across the industry. Analyze competitors within your niche to see if they’ve experienced similar traffic fluctuations.
Tools like Similarweb, Semrush, or Ahrefs can help you compare performance trends. If multiple sites in your category are seeing drops or gains, the update likely had broader implications, and understanding these patterns can guide your next steps.
Review Other Metrics: Beyond rankings and traffic, additional metrics can offer a clearer picture of how a Google update has impacted your site.
Publishers/Bloggers can turn to tools like Google Search Console and Google Analytics 4 to dig deeper. Metrics such as engagement rate, average session duration, and bounce rate can help identify what’s truly affecting your performance.
- Assess core update impact by monitoring keyword ranking shifts within a 15-day window before and after the update.
- Watch for sudden traffic spikes or drops that may signal alignment or conflict with algorithm changes.
- Compare your performance with competitors using tools like Semrush, Ahrefs, or Similarweb to check if the impact is industry-wide.
- Review GA4 and Search Console metrics-such as engagement rate, session duration, and bounce rate—for deeper insight into traffic quality and user behavior.
How To Recover From Google Algorithm Update?
Performance Evaluation
Begin by understanding how the updates have impacted your website, your blogs, and other pages that have performed well. If you notice there’s a correlation between updates and content quality issues, it might as well be the time to work on the content quality.
Follow EEAT
Every piece of your content should reflect EEAT guidelines in your blogs. EEAT is a guideline set forth by Google to assess the reliability and quality of the content. Thus, demonstrating EEAT signals in your content can position your website higher in the search results.
Regularly following the EAT and keeping up with the user intent also minimizes publishers’ risks of being affected by the updates.
This takes us to our next practice, which is updating or revamping the underperforming content with potential to attract traffic.
Update Underperforming Pages
As per Webtribunal, authors produce about 6 million blogs every day. So, it goes without saying that thin blogs/articles or content that doesn’t showcase topical authority will find it difficult than ever to rank on SERPs.
Therefore, identify pages that have lost visibility or traffic and update them with fresh, accurate, and helpful content that meets the user intent. Moreover, add internal links, improve readability, and ensure the content aligns with the current user search intent to improve chances of recovery.
Don’t Rush to Fix
It’s recommended to avoid making drastic changes to your website unless there’s a clear indication that the update has negatively impacted your performance. Short-term ranking fluctuations are common for publishers and bloggers, so it’s best to wait for trends to stabilize before taking action.
- Assess core update impact by monitoring keyword ranking shifts within a 15-day window before and after the update.
- Watch for sudden traffic spikes or drops that may signal alignment or conflict with algorithm changes.
- Compare your performance with competitors using tools like Semrush, Ahrefs, or Similarweb to check if the impact is industry-wide.
- Review GA4 and Search Console metrics-such as engagement rate, session duration, and bounce rate—for deeper insight into traffic quality and user behavior.
Expert Opinion!
Here’s what we’ve seen consistently work for sustainable recovery post-2025 updates:
- EEAT-Focused Content Audits We perform in-depth audits to prune outdated or thin content and rewrite underperforming pages to meet Google’s EEAT criteria—with special attention to showcasing real-world expertise, author transparency, and trust signals like external citations.
- Semantic SEO + Topical Clustering Leveraging LLM-powered tools, we build semantic content maps that strengthen topical authority through tightly linked content clusters. This structure helps Google clearly understand the site’s depth and coverage on specific themes.
- Core Web Vitals & UX The 2025 update emphasized technical health more than ever. We focus on optimizing Core Web Vitals, improving mobile responsiveness, and ensuring fast-loading, accessible, and well-structured content layouts.
- Author Trust Signals Adding detailed author bios with credentials, LinkedIn profiles, and firsthand experience greatly improves content trustworthiness and enhances visibility in Google’s SERPs.
Closing Notes
The June 2025 Core Update has brought partial recovery for many publishers, not just in rankings but also in ad revenue. With improved visibility, monetization opportunities are growing, but not uniformly. Some sites remain unaffected or continue to see declines, highlighting the need for ongoing evaluation and content improvement.
Moving forward, sustainable growth will rely on more than jusr traffic. Publishers must focus on content quality, demonstrate EEAT, and adapt to evolving user intent and monetization models. Those who invest in long-term value creation will be better equipped to navigate future updates and secure consistent revenue.
Reviewed by Deepak Sharma, Content Editor at Adpushup As part of AdPushup’s content team. Deepak Sharma handles editorial review and content optimization for adtech articles. He focuses on clarity and accuracy to help readers understand advertising technology topics.
