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I've never focused too much on the actual PageRank on my sites but, after having had a specific one for few years that is still at zero I start to worry that I've been somehow blacklisted. Is there a way to check if that's the case? The site has always been a little slim on content as it's a single-page app.

Lorenzo
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1 Answers1

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Google has stopped publishing PageRank publicly. The last time the Google Toolbar was updated with new PageRank data was December 2013. Google has said that it will never be updated again.

If your site was created after December 2013, your toolbar PageRank will always and forever read "0". If you changed anything about your URLs since December 2013, your PageRank will be zero. That includes:

  • Adding are removing the www
  • Moving to or from HTTPS
  • Adding or removing index.html
  • Changing your domain name

Google still does measure and use PageRank internally. The best way to know if your site has PageRank is to check that it is being crawled and indexed. If Googlebot is coming back to recrawl your pages periodically, you are in fine shape.

Stephen Ostermiller
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    Do you have a reference link for "Google has said that it will never be updated again."? – Jason C Mar 29 '15 at 13:48
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    @JasonC I did not do a search on the web for you, however, I do remember this as being announced. There was a tapering off for a period before it just plain stopped. In the announcement I saw, it talked about shutting the process down that makes the metric public and that it will run a few times more then likely stop with the possibility of yearly updates. The reason for this is because spammers used this metric to measure how well they are manipulating Google. Stopping the frequent updating would help to stop spam. – closetnoc Mar 29 '15 at 15:41
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    Ah, here we go, John Mueller mentions it in a hangout here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-GlxLlpm3Ew&feature=youtu.be&t=20m30s (I wasn't questioning the claim, I just thought extra details would be helpful.) There's also a summary at http://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-will-probably-updating-toolbar-pagerank-john-mueller-confirms/117691/. I didn't find any follow-up that mentions possible yearly updates, but I also didn't look much beyond that. The video seems to be what all the blogs and articles that mentioned the change ultimately refer back to. cc @closetnoc – Jason C Mar 29 '15 at 15:46
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    @JasonC Perfect!! Thanks for the info. I did not doubt your motives. I was going off of memories and I am getting old enough that sometimes I wonder if I remember something correctly. ;-) I tell people that senility starts early in my family- about 2pm. – closetnoc Mar 29 '15 at 16:52
  • I've edited the link to the video directly into the answer. – Stephen Ostermiller Mar 29 '15 at 20:27
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    I find it astonishing that still, in 2015, so many website owners are still worrying/fretting over the visible toolbar PageRank. :/ Seriously - who out there is actually still telling these people to look at PR, own up! – zigojacko Apr 02 '15 at 08:55
  • The amount of upvotes on this very question is probably indicative of how many other people found this useful. We've been bleating on about PR being a useless and outdated metric now for how many years!? – zigojacko Apr 02 '15 at 08:57
  • I still love PageRank as a metric. It is certainly less important than it used to be, but Google still uses it, and it influences rankings. You just can't measure it with the Google Toolbar anymore. You have to rely on third party calculations are look at your Googlebot crawl rate. – Stephen Ostermiller Apr 02 '15 at 09:42