Search engine optimization
SEO Insights
Everything we write about how Google works, what changes in an algorithm update and what that does to sites is collected here. Most of these articles come out of data we measured on projects we run; they are not theoretical round-ups.
121 articlesLatest article: September 11, 2026Page 1 of 11
- Google core updates and reading their results through data
- Technical SEO: crawling, indexing, Core Web Vitals and page speed
- Content, authority, E-E-A-T and entity work
Start with the basics. These articles go topic by topic. To read what SEO is and how the new methodology works on a single page, see our What Is SEO guide.
What Is SEO?
Zero-Click Search: What It Costs and What Earns a Click
Zero-click search means Google answers and nobody visits. In early 2026, 68% of US searches ended without a click. What it cost publishers, and what still works.
Google AI Overviews: The Lawsuits, the Data, the Fix
Two antitrust suits, a judge calling it unfair, and 38% less publisher traffic. What the US data shows about AI Overviews and how to get cited in them.
GEO vs. AEO vs. AIO: Which Term Is Winning, and Why?
Three names for the same work: GEO, AEO and AIO. We compared a practitioner survey, search volume, arXiv and Google Trends to see which term wins, and why.
Localhost SEO Check: Auditing a Site Nobody Can Reach Yet
Audit tools have to reach your page from the outside, which leaves localhost, staging and login-gated pages unchecked. We moved the analysis into the browser.
What Is Backrub? Google's Original Name
Backrub was Google's first name. Where it came from, how it worked at Stanford in 1996, and how that early project grew into Google.
The Best Hosting Providers in Germany: 20 Measured
I measured 20 German hosting providers with our own tool. Five of them do not keep their own website in Germany, and three still serve over HTTP/1.1.
What Is the Average Mobile User's Phone?
Testing a Next.js site on the newest iPhone tells you nothing. How we picked an average device, and how to throttle the CPU so you see what your visitors see.
Are Next.js Projects Better for SEO?
Speed, crawl budget and community pull all favor Next.js, but the platform you actually have command of beats the modern one you cannot step into.
SEO’s Smallest Building Block: the Millisecond
SEO used to be built on links. Today the unit is the millisecond a user spends usefully on your site. Why 0.1 means something to us.
Multimodal SEO: Structuring Pages for the Modern Web
Google now reads video and images the way a person does. Why writers who stay inside plain text will not survive, and what to add to the job.
What Changed in the March 2026 Google Update
Google set its definition of quality on harder ground. Information gain is now the line: what did the page add that was not already in the world?
Google Cut the HTML Crawl Limit to 2 MB
Googlebot now reads the first 2 MB of your HTML, down from 15 MB. What inflates a page past that, and what gets left unindexed when it happens.
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