The Google September 2026 spam update is now rolling out, potentially changing search rankings for websites around the world.
Google began the update on September 24, 2026, at 9:15 a.m. Pacific time. According to the company’s official Search Status Dashboard, the update applies globally and to all languages, and the rollout may take up to two weeks to complete. Google Search Status Dashboard announcement
That means bloggers, publishers, affiliate marketers, online businesses, and other website owners could see search visibility fluctuate while the update rolls out.
But there is an important limitation to what we know so far: Google has not said that this update is aimed at one particular type of spam or one particular type of website.
So if your rankings move over the next several days, it is worth paying attention—but not jumping immediately to conclusions.
What Is the Google September 2026 Spam Update?
Google continuously uses automated systems to identify spam and attempts to manipulate its search rankings.
From time to time, the company makes substantial improvements to those systems and announces what it calls a spam update.
Google explains that its spam-detection systems operate continuously, while announced spam updates represent notable improvements to those systems. One of those systems is SpamBrain, Google’s AI-based spam-prevention technology. Google Search spam updates and your site
The September update is officially listed as affecting ranking.
Google has confirmed three key details:
- The update began September 24, 2026.
- It applies worldwide and across all languages.
- The rollout may take up to two weeks.
Google’s ranking-update history also shows spam updates earlier in March, June, and August, making September another confirmed spam-related ranking update during 2026.
What Google has not announced is equally important.
There is currently no official statement saying the September update specifically targets AI-generated articles, affiliate websites, backlinks, expired domains, or another individual spam technique.
Those practices may fall under existing Google policies, but that does not mean Google has identified any one of them as the specific focus of this update.
What Does Google Consider Search Spam?
Google defines search spam broadly as techniques intended to deceive users or manipulate its search systems into giving content greater visibility than it otherwise deserves.
Its current spam policies for Google Search cover a wide range of practices.
Several are particularly relevant to publishers and online businesses.
Scaled Content Abuse
Scaled content abuse involves creating large numbers of pages primarily to manipulate search rankings rather than genuinely help users.
This can include using AI or other automation to generate large amounts of low-value content, scraping information from other sites, combining material from different sources without adding value, or producing many pages primarily around search keywords.
The important distinction is purpose and value, not simply whether AI was involved.
Using AI does not automatically make content spam.
Google has separately explained that automation and AI can be used to help create useful content. The problem occurs when automation is used primarily to manipulate rankings rather than help readers.
Keyword Stuffing
Repeating keywords unnaturally in an attempt to rank higher remains against Google’s spam policies.
That means SEO should help clarify what a page is about—not turn an article into a repetitive collection of search phrases.
If you’re still building your SEO foundation, Income Idea Index’s SEO for Beginners: How to Get Your Website Found on Google and AI Search covers keywords, titles, internal links, page structure, and people-first SEO in more detail.
Link Spam
Google also prohibits links created primarily to manipulate ranking signals.
Examples include buying links for ranking purposes, excessive link exchanges, automated link building, and paid links that improperly pass ranking credit.
Paid, sponsored, and affiliate relationships themselves are not automatically a problem. Google provides ways to properly identify commercial links, including the rel="sponsored" attribute.
Thin Affiliate Content
Affiliate marketing itself is not against Google’s rules.
Google specifically describes “thin affiliation” as affiliate content that adds little or no original value—for example, copying a merchant’s product descriptions or publishing essentially the same material distributed to many affiliate sites.
Google also says good affiliate pages can add meaningful value through original reviews, testing, comparisons, pricing information, navigation, or other useful information.
That distinction matters for anyone building an affiliate business.
Income Idea Index discusses the changing search environment further in Affiliate Marketing in 2026: Is It Still Worth It?.
