Google Discover: how does it work and how do you appear in it?

What is Google Discover?

The feed was called “Google feed” when it launched in 2017. Google renamed it Discover on September 24, 2018 and opened it to google.com on all mobile browsers. The same post introduced evergreen content: not new to the Web, but new to the person discovering it.

The figure of more than 500 million daily active users comes from a Google job posting, with no date or scope. It is not an official announcement.

Discover opens in the Google app or on google.com, in the browser of an Android phone or tablet. On some devices, you just swipe right from the home screen. Discover is part of Google Search: most of the principles in our SEO guide apply to it.

Discover vs Google Search: what are the differences?

How does Google choose Discover content?

Google Discover starts from each user’s data: Web & App Activity, device, personal results, Location History. Without a home address, Google estimates the location from the IP address. Google’s help page warns that these settings are being updated.

To judge how helpful content is, Discover uses many of the same signals and systems as Search. An older article can therefore appear if it is still helpful and relevant.

Discover looks for content suited to a feed, such as articles and videos. It may leave out job applications, petitions, forms, code repositories and satire without context. SafeSearch also filters out what may shock.

The Google Discover feed changed in 2025 and 2026:

• since September 17, 2025, users can “follow” a publisher or creator in Discover, which also shows posts from X and Instagram and YouTube Shorts;
• this has nothing to do with the old RSS-based “Follow” feature, removed from the documentation on November 19, 2025 because Discover no longer shows it;
• since June 4, 2026, in the United States only, following a source from its Search profile makes its content appear more often in Discover.

How do you get your site into Google Discover?

There is nothing to submit. Content is eligible as soon as it is indexed by Google and meets the Discover content policies. No special tag or structured data is required, and eligibility does not guarantee display.

Google’s Discover guidelines, expanded on February 5, 2026, come down to six points:

1. Accurate title: a title that captures the essence of the content, without holding back the key information to force the click.
2. No sensationalism: no catering to morbid curiosity, titillation or outrage (wording of the English version of the guidelines).
3. Timely or unique topic: content tied to current interests, that tells a story or brings unique insights.
4. Expertise by topic: in-depth, original content in the areas where the site is an expert.
5. Transparency: clear dates and bylines, information about the author, the publication and the publisher.
6. Pleasant page: a good experience across the whole page.

Our page on helpful, reliable content covers author and source signals in detail. And since Discover accepts older helpful content, an SEO content strategy that mixes news and in-depth articles keeps the latter eligible.

Which images for Discover?

Without the max-image-preview rule, Google may show a default-size preview; with large, the preview can fill the full width of the screen. In the source code:

• robots tag: <meta name="robots" content="max-image-preview:large">;
• sharing image: <meta property="og:image" content="https://exemple.fr/image-1200x675.jpg">.

Google reads schema.org markup and the og:image tag, but image preview selection remains fully automated. For Article structured data, it recommends several images of at least 50,000 pixels, in 16×9, 4×3 and 1×1 aspect ratios.

On WordPress: what Yoast already handles

By default, Yoast SEO adds max-image-preview:large to the robots tag of every page that is neither noindex nor nosnippet. This behavior dates from version 12.2, announced on October 1, 2019.

Elev8 Lab’s check on October 19, 2026, on one of the site’s articles: the robots tag does contain max-image-preview:large. The main image is 1,600 × 1,000 px and the sharing image 1,200 × 750 px, a 16:10 ratio. Both exceed 1,200 px and 300,000 pixels, without following the recommended 16:9 aspect ratio. So they are not models for Google Discover.

What does the February 2026 Discover update change?

On February 5, 2026, John Mueller announced a core update specific to Discover on the Google Search Central blog. It aims for three effects:

• more local content, from sites based in the user’s country;
• less sensationalism and clickbait;
• more in-depth, original and timely content, from sites with expertise in a field.

Google assesses this expertise topic by topic. A site that is expert in a single field and a site that covers several have the same chances. Google’s example contrasts a local news site with a gardening section and a movie review site that publishes a single article about gardening.

The rollout, first limited to English-language users in the United States, was completed on February 27, 2026 according to the Search Status Dashboard. This dashboard also tracks Search core updates. Google plans to extend it to all countries and all languages, with no date.

Which rules can exclude a site from Discover?

The Discover content policies build on the general policies and spam policies of Search. They also include those of Search features: dangerous, deceptive, hateful, violent or sexually explicit content, among others. They add three rules of their own:

Google may remove non-compliant content from Discover. For repeated or egregious violations, it may ban the site from Discover and from surfaces such as Chrome’s article suggestions. A manual action may then appear in Search Console, under “Security and Manual actions”.

How do you measure your Google Discover traffic?

Search Console has a Discover performance report. It gives impressions, clicks and CTR for the last 16 months, Chrome traffic included. It only appears above a minimum threshold of impressions.

Its rules differ from those of the Search report:

• no query dimension, since Discover does not depend on queries;
• metrics attributed to the canonical URL;
• a single impression counted per result and per session;
• a table limited to 1,000 rows;
• grouping by page, country, Discover appearance and date.

Google Discover traffic fluctuates more than Search traffic. Google explains this by changing interests, adjustments to the types of content shown and Search updates, since Discover is an extension of Search. It advises treating it as a supplement to keyword-driven traffic.

To set up the tool and read its other reports, see our Search Console guide.

Discover and generative AI: what does Search Console show?

On October 13, 2025, Google added short AI-generated previews of trending topics to Discover, with links to the Web. The feature was then available in the United States, South Korea and India. No Google source we read reports it in France.

Since August 31, 2026, all sites have access to the generative AI performance reports, launched on June 3, 2026. The Discover view counts impressions of links to the site, by page (canonical URL), country and date. It reports no clicks and stays absent if the site has too few impressions or has opted out.

The Search Console opt-out control is under Settings, then Search generative AI. The effect takes one to two days, sometimes longer. Google states that this control is not a ranking signal for the rest of Search.

In October 2026, a Google job posting for the Discover Feed Recommendation team mentions recommending AI-generated content. This is a weak signal, not a product announcement.

How do you turn on, turn off or find Discover?

For users, Google Discover is controlled by a switch:

1. In the Google app: profile picture, Settings, General, then the Discover switch.
2. In the browser: google.com, profile picture, Other settings, then “Show Discover on home page”.
3. On a card in the feed: follow an interest, or hide a topic or a source.

Turning off personal results removes personalized stories. On August 20, 2026, Google also announced a way to adjust the feed in natural language, without specifying the countries.

These options are not available in all countries or all languages. Google’s Discover help details each setting.