Guide : Metadata & Trust Schema

Metadata & Trust schema is my catch-all pour the schema.org types — AggregateRating, BreadcrumbList, Examiner, and WebSite — que don't sell anything but attach trust signals, site identity, and navigational context to une page. Here's how ils relate and quand to utiliser qui.

Première publication : 28 juin 2026 · Dernière mise à jour : 3 août 2026 · Advanced
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"Metadata & Trust schema" is my practitioner étiquette — pas a Google or schema.org category — pour the schema.org types que don't sell anything (Product/JobPosting) or nom a real-world entity (Organization/Person), but à la place attach trust and orientation to ordinary pages: Examiner and AggregateRating (star ratings / social proof), BreadcrumbList (site hierarchy and wayfinding), and WebSite (the identity of le site itself). Google and schema.org don't fichier ces four ensemble soit, and leur documentation status is uneven — Examiner/AggregateRating and BreadcrumbList chaque have a live fonctionnalité guide, pendant que WebSite is the odd un out with aucun unique current guide and its la plupart famous fonctionnalité, le sitelinks searchbox, deprecated November 21, 2024 (though WebSite itself isn't deprecated — it encore helps Google comprendre site noms). None of the four is a ranking factor, and none is a documented E-E-A-T signal — ils earn eligibility pour a rich-result treatment, pas rank or trust. The risk is mostly mild — a manquant property or a self-serving examiner simplement costs eligibility — but deliberately misleading or fake markup peut encore draw a manual action sous Google's general structured-data guidelines, the même risk quelconque données structurées carries.

TL;DR — “Metadata & Trust schema” is my practitioner grouping, pas a Google or schema.org category, pour the types que attach trust and orientation to ordinary pages plutôt que selling something: Examiner, AggregateRating, BreadcrumbList, and WebSite. Google doesn’t fichier les as a family, and leur documentation status is uneven — Examiner/AggregateRating and BreadcrumbList chaque have a live, dedicated fonctionnalité guide, pendant que WebSite is the odd un out, with aucun unique current guide and its la plupart famous fonctionnalité (le sitelinks searchbox) deprecated November 21, 2024. WebSite itself is pas deprecated — it encore helps Google comprendre a site’s nom. The sharpest rule is the self-serving reviews policy: a business can’t earn star snippets pour reviews of itself (scoped to LocalBusiness/Organization, pas Product). None of the four is a ranking factor or a documented E-E-A-T signal; ils buy eligibility pour a SERP treatment, pas trust. The risk is mostly mild — a manquant property or a self-serving examiner simplement costs eligibility — but deliberately misleading or fake markup peut encore draw a manual action sous Google’s general guidelines.

Premier, an honest framing: ce is my grouping, pas Google’s

Schema.org defines types and properties, but markup ne fait pas independently vérifier que claims are trustworthy. Evidence for this claim Official or primary documentation supporting the adjacent article claim, with scope limited to the source's published description. Scope: No ranking guarantee or undisclosed system mechanics are inferred beyond the cited source. Confidence: high · Verified: Schema.org schemas Google states que valid données structurées ne fait pas guarantee afficher as a rich result or ranking benefit. Evidence for this claim Official or primary documentation supporting the adjacent article claim, with scope limited to the source's published description. Scope: No ranking guarantee or undisclosed system mechanics are inferred beyond the cited source. Confidence: high · Verified: Google: Structured data policies

I vouloir to be transparent up front, parce que la plupart content que talks à propos de “trust” or “metadata” schema quietly implies ces types are an official family. They’re pas — the même disclaimer I faire pour commerce schema s’applique ici.

  • Google’s propre docs don’t groupe les. In the données structurées gallery, “Breadcrumb” and “Review snippet” chaque sit as leur propre entries in the general Fonctionnalité guides liste — correct alongside unrelated types comme Article and Local business. WebSite doesn’t même obtenir a standalone feature-guide entry the façon the others do.
  • schema.org doesn’t unify les. Examiner and AggregateRating are fermer cousins, but BreadcrumbList is a kind of liste, and WebSite is a kind of creative fonctionner — three différent branches of the vocabulary. There’s aucun shared parent que dit “ces four are the trust types.”

So pourquoi put les in un article? Parce que in pratique — the façon an SEO en réalité fonctionne — they’re the même kind of problem: content vous mark up pas to unlock a shopping or jobs fonctionnalité, but to establish que une page is credible, locatable, and partie of a réel site. Que shared utiliser cas is réel and utile. The shared taxonomy n’est pas. I’d plutôt dire que plainly que pretend Google drew ce box.

The four types En un coup d’œil

  • AggregateRating (schema.org/AggregateRating) — the summary rating: an average score plus a count, e.g. “4.6 stars from 312 ratings.” It’s ce que powers the star snippet on la plupart pages. Minimum pour a rich result: ratingValue plus au moins un of ratingCount or reviewCount, nested sous the chose it’s rating.
  • BreadcrumbList (schema.org/BreadcrumbList) — lune page’s position in le site hierarchy, expressed as an ordered array of ListItem objects. Google peut utiliser it to categorize lune page and (on desktop) montrer a breadcrumb trail in placer of the raw URL. Exige au moins two ListItem entries, chaque with a position and a name.
  • Examiner (schema.org/Review) — a unique examiner, with an author, a reviewRating.ratingValue, and the item it’s à propos de (itemReviewed). Multiple reviews on a page typically roll up into an AggregateRating pour the star afficher.
  • WebSite (schema.org/WebSite) — the identity of le site itself, distinct from quelconque unique page. It une fois powered le sitelinks searchbox via SearchAction; today its live valeur is helping Google comprendre a site’s nom pour afficher in results.

I garder ce hub deliberately shallow on chaque type’s property tables — the deep dives live in the four child articles I point to at the fin.

Où ils sit in the schema.org hierarchy

Ce is the partie almost nobody cites correctement, and it’s the difference entre a guess and a fact:

  • AggregateRatingThing > Intangible > Rating > AggregateRating. A specialized kind of Rating.
  • ExaminerThing > CreativeWork > Review. A creative fonctionner, pas a rating — it carries a rating (reviewRating) plutôt que being un. That’s pourquoi Examiner and AggregateRating are cousins, pas the même type.
  • BreadcrumbListThing > Intangible > ItemList > BreadcrumbList, construit from ListItem entries. A liste type, unrelated to ratings.
  • WebSiteThing > CreativeWork > WebSite. A creative fonctionner comme Examiner, but a wholly différent objectif.

Conclusion: there’s aucun unique shared parent binding ces four. AggregateRating and Examiner les deux concern ratings but live in différent branches; BreadcrumbList is a liste; WebSite is a site. The connective tissue is the SEO utiliser cas — trust and orientation — pas type inheritance. Dire que, and you’re on solid ground.

Shared ground rules à travers tout four

Même though the types don’t share a taxonomy, ils share Google’s general structured-data guidelines, and it’s worth stating the rules une fois:

  • Requis properties are the eligibility gate. Miss a requis property and lune page isn’t eligible pour que rich result. As Google puts it, items manquant requis properties ne sont pas eligible, and the plus recommended properties vous provide, the plus élevé quality the result is to utilisateurs.
  • Eligibility ≠ guaranteed afficher. Valid markup obtient vous into the pool; Google’s systems encore separately decide si to montrer the enhancement. Google doesn’t guarantee votre données structurées va montrer up même si lune page is marked up correctement.
  • Seulement mark up visible, accurate content. Aucun invisible markup, aucun fake reviews, aucun misleading données. Google is explicit à propos de pas marking up content que isn’t visible to readers and pas marking up fake reviews — qui lands hardest on ce groupe, since Examiner and AggregateRating are exactly the types personnes are tempted to fake.
  • JSON-LD is the recommended format pour tout of les — easier to maintain at scale que inline Microdata/RDFa.

Ce que sets chaque apart

Examiner / AggregateRating: the self-serving reviews rule

Ce is the sharpest, la plupart myth-relevant rule in the whole groupe. Si the entity being reviewed contrôle the reviews à propos de itself, its pages en utilisant LocalBusiness or quelconque autre Organization type are ineligible pour the star examiner fonctionnalité. In plain terms: vous pouvez’t mark up testimonials on votre propre homepage and expect stars pour votre propre business. Crucially, ce restriction is scoped to LocalBusiness/Organization — it fait pas blanket-block reviews of autre schema types comme Product. A store showing genuine customer reviews of a Product it sells is a différent situation from a business rating itself.

A few plus rules worth carrying: the examiner content vous mark up doit be readily disponible and obvious to utilisateurs on lune page, and vous doit pas aggregate reviews or ratings scraped from autre websites. Examiner and AggregateRating are aussi usually nested sous the chose ils décrire plutôt que floating standalone — Google has clarified the nesting expectations pour how Examiner/AggregateRating attach to the reviewed item, so ce is worth getting correct in the child article.

Breadcrumbs are the cheapest, lowest-risk markup ici. The un rule personnes miss: provide breadcrumbs que represent a typical utilisateur chemin to lune page, pas a mirror of votre URL structure, and don’t inclure the top-level domain or the current page itself as items. Aussi, the old data-vocabulary.org breadcrumb markup is ne … plus eligible — vous doit utiliser schema.org.

The lesson BreadcrumbList teaches meilleur is que a afficher surface peut disappear sans the underlying fonctionnalité or markup requirement going away. In January 2025 Google stopped showing the breadcrumb trail in l’URL row on mobile résultats de recherche — desktop was unaffected, aucun action was requis from site owners, and les deux the markup and the Search Console Breadcrumb report kept working as avant. The markup didn’t become useless; a unique afficher placement simplement went away.

WebSite is the type que breaks the pattern — and que asymmetry is itself the finding.

  • Le sitelinks searchbox is gone. WebSite’s SearchAction (potentialAction) une fois powered the “Sitelinks Search Box.” Google announced its removal in an October 21, 2024 blog post and deprecated the visual fonctionnalité starting November 21, 2024, citing dropped usage; it’s been supprimé from the Résultats enrichis Tester and Search Console reports. Leaving the old markup in placer causes aucun errors and has aucun negative effect — it’s simply inert now.
  • WebSite itself n’est pas deprecated. Ce is the distinction personnes fumble. Seulement the searchbox utiliser cas went away. WebSite is encore partie of how Google determines a site’s nom pour afficher in results (a live fonctionnalité), and it remains schema.org’s canonical façon to identifier le site as an entity distinct from quelconque unique page.
  • Thinner, scattered documentation. Unlike the autre three, WebSite has aucun unique current Google feature-guide page — its guidance is split à travers site-name documentation and the now-archived searchbox docs. That’s worth stating plainly: WebSite is the least feature-rich of the four pour Search today.

Fait ce schema aider SEO?

Aucun, pas rankings. John Mueller has been direct: “Données structurées won’t faire votre site rank meilleur.” Ce que it fait is earn eligibility pour a spécifique SERP treatment — star snippets (Examiner/AggregateRating), a breadcrumb trail (BreadcrumbList) — or, in WebSite’s cas, aider Google comprendre votre site’s identity. Conflating “I added schema” with “I’ll rank better” is the unique la plupart courant myth à travers tout four types.

Un plus myth worth naming directement, donné the “trust” in ce hub’s propre nom: none of ce is a documented E-E-A-T signal soit. E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) is a framework Google’s human quality raters utiliser to judge content — it isn’t a scored input Google has said quelconque of ces four types feed into. “Trust” ici is my practitioner shorthand pour the reader-facing effect (stars and a breadcrumb trail lire as plus credible to a person scanning results), pas a claim que Google’s algorithm scores votre page’s trustworthiness parce que vous ajouté Examiner or AggregateRating markup. The même goes pour entity consolidation, Knowledge Panel inclusion, and AI-citation outcomes — nothing ici documents quelconque of ces four types producing ceux results soit; treat quelconque claim que ils do as unverified.

The risk profile is worth comparing with the commerce hub, but I don’t vouloir to overstate the gap. Commerce schema noms a spécifique manual-action risk: a stale, unremoved JobPosting. La plupart of ce que goes incorrect with ce groupe is milder — a manquant requis property or a self-serving examiner simplement drops lune page from eligibility; the markup obtient ignored plutôt que punished. But that’s pas the whole risk picture. Google’s general structured-data guidelines cover plus que eligibility, and ils appliquer to ces four the même as anything sinon: markup that’s invisible to utilisateurs, misleading, or construit from fake reviews peut encore draw a manual action, separate from le site’s ordinary ranking systems. So the honest framing isn’t “ces four peut jamais earn a manual action” — it’s que the courant échec mode ici (a manquant property, a self-serving rating) is ineligibility, pendant que deliberately deceptive markup carries the même general risk quelconque données structurées fait.

Où to go suivant

Ce hub is the map; chaque of ces is its propre deep dive nested sous it:

  • AggregateRating schema — requis vs. recommended properties, the ratingCount vs. reviewCount distinction, and how AggregateRating relates to (and rolls up) individual Examiner markup. Commencer ici si vous vouloir the summary star rating on une page.
  • BreadcrumbList schema — the ListItem array structure, the “typical user path” rule vs. mirroring votre URL, and the January 2025 mobile afficher modifier. Commencer ici pour site hierarchy and breadcrumb trails.
  • Examiner schema — the self-serving reviews policy in detail, nesting sous itemReviewed, and qui entity types peut and can’t earn star snippets. Commencer ici pour individual reviews and testimonials fait correct.
  • WebSite schema — the SearchAction/sitelinks-searchbox history and its November 2024 deprecation, plus the still-live site-name fonctionnalité. Commencer ici si you’re wondering si WebSite markup is encore worth ajout in 2026.

Pour the wider picture, ce hub nests sous the broader structured données subcluster — Voir aussi the sibling schema markup and commerce schema hub articles là pour the vocabulary, formats, and deprecation cycle. And it tout lives in the on-page cluster, où données structurées sits alongside the rest of on-page SEO technique.

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