Google has been removing rich result types for 3 years. FAQ rich results stopped appearing on May 7, 2026, after How-to ended in 2023 and 7 lesser-used types were announced for phase-out in 2025. What remains is the markup tied to real business information: organization, local business, product, review, article, event, job, software, and video.
The timeline
Each entry below comes from Google’s own announcements and its documentation update log.
| Date | What Google did |
|---|---|
| Aug 8, 2023 | Limited FAQ rich results to well-known government and health sites and How-to results to desktop |
| Sep 13, 2023 | Stopped showing How-to rich results on desktop, making the type deprecated |
| Jun 12, 2025 | Announced phase-out of Book Actions, Course Info, Claim Review, Estimated Salary, Learning Video, Special Announcement, and Vehicle Listing |
| Nov 5, 2025 | Announced phase-out of practice problem markup, and clarified that Dataset markup is used only by Dataset Search. Removed the deprecation banner from Book actions because a feature still uses it |
| May 7, 2026 | FAQ rich results stopped appearing in Google Search |
| Jun 15, 2026 | Removed the FAQ rich result documentation |
Google’s reasoning in the 2025 post was that the types were not commonly used and the displays no longer gave users much added value. It said the change would not affect how pages are ranked.
What the gallery lists now
Google’s structured data gallery was last updated on Jun 15, 2026. It lists the types Google Search supports for rich results. Grouped by what a typical business or publisher cares about:
- Who you are: Organization (logo, legal name, address, and contact details, which can appear in knowledge panels) and Local business (open hours, ratings, directions, and booking or ordering actions).
- What you sell: Product (price, availability, and review ratings), Review snippet, Software app, and Vacation rental.
- What you publish: Article, Video, Breadcrumb, Image metadata, Recipe, Event, Profile page, Discussion forum, and Q&A.
- Hiring: Job posting and Employer aggregate rating.
The page also lists types such as Course list, Movie, Dataset, Math solver, Education Q&A, Speakable, and Subscription and paywalled content for narrower uses. FAQ and How-to are not on it.
Google adds a note that the actual appearance in search results might differ from what the documentation shows, and that “eligible” does not mean “shown.” Valid markup makes a page a candidate. It does not guarantee a rich result.
What this means in practice
Our view, using the list above:
- Organization and Local business markup are still worth doing. They state facts about you, and Google says they feed knowledge panels. Keep the details identical to your Business Profile and your site footer.
- Product and Review snippet matter for sellers, with a warning. Google’s update log shows a new guideline added on Jul 24, 2026 about fake and undisclosed incentivized reviews. Do not mark up reviews you cannot defend.
- Breadcrumb and Article are cheap and low risk. They clarify structure for every page that has them.
- Software app fits SaaS pages, where you can describe the app, its rating information, and a link to it, but only if the information is real and on the page.
- Video and Event are worth doing when you have those things. They are not worth inventing.
What current markup looks like
Here is a small Organization block for a made-up company. It is an illustration, not a template to paste as is.
{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "Organization",
"name": "Example Plumbing Co.",
"url": "https://example.com",
"logo": "https://example.com/logo.png",
"address": {
"@type": "PostalAddress",
"streetAddress": "100 Main Street",
"addressLocality": "Hartford",
"addressRegion": "CT",
"postalCode": "06103"
}
}Every field in it is something a visitor can also find on the page. That is the rule worth keeping. Google’s AI features documentation says to make sure your structured data matches the visible text on the page, and markup that claims a price, rating, or address the page does not show puts the rest of your markup in doubt.
Where mistakes come from
A common cause of mismatched markup is drift rather than a one-time mistake. A template emits a price that the page no longer shows. A review count is hard-coded in the markup and never updates. An address changes in the footer and not in the JSON. Put the markup in the same template as the visible content, pull both from the same fields, and the 2 stay in sync without anyone remembering to check.
What to do with FAQ and How-to markup
If your pages still have FAQPage or HowTo markup, Google’s documentation says the FAQ feature is no longer shown in Search, and the documentation for it has been removed. It does not say the leftover markup causes harm. Treat removal as housekeeping you can do when you next touch the template.
Keep the questions and answers themselves on the page if they help readers. A visible FAQ still answers real questions. The rich result is gone, and the content is not. Google’s AI features guidance also says markup should match the visible text on the page, which is one more reason not to leave markup describing content that no longer exists.
Our guide to FAQ schema covers what to keep and where it still has a use.
Structured data and AI answers
Several guides claim you need special schema to be cited by AI engines. Google’s documentation says otherwise. Its AI features page says there is no special schema.org markup needed to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode. Its generative AI optimization guide lists “overfocusing on structured data” among the myths, saying structured data is not required for generative AI search, and still recommends it as part of overall SEO because it helps with eligibility for rich results.
That is Google’s position about Google. We found no comparable statement from other engines in the sources we reviewed, so there is no basis for claiming markup helps or hurts elsewhere.
A short audit
- List the structured data types on your 10 highest-traffic templates.
- Mark each as still listed in the gallery or not.
- For the ones that are still listed, check that the data matches what is visible on the page.
- For the retired ones, schedule removal with the next template change.
- Test with Google’s Rich Results Test and watch the enhancement reports in Search Console for errors. Re-run the audit every quarter, since the supported list has changed in 2023, 2025, and 2026.
Our overview of schema markup basics covers the types worth keeping in more detail. The list will keep shrinking, and Google’s update log is the place to check before you invest in a new type.
