What is AggregateRating structured data, and how do you add it?

What is AggregateRating structured data?

Structured data is a standardized format that provides information about a page and helps classify its content. The AggregateRating type, defined by Schema.org, represents an average rating derived from multiple individual ratings or reviews. This type of structured data is used to summarize user feedback.

Google documents that a review snippet is a short excerpt of a review or a rating from a review website, often an average of combined scores from many reviewers. When Google identifies valid review or rating markup, it may display a rich snippet in search results. These rich snippets can include star ratings and other summary details, enhancing the appearance of a search result.

For product pages, adding structured data like AggregateRating can enable product information to appear in richer ways across Google Search results, including Google Images and Google Lens. Users can see details such as review ratings directly in search results, which helps them evaluate products before clicking through to a page.

What information does AggregateRating require?

To display a rich snippet for aggregate reviews, Google requires the average rating to be supplied. Schema.org defines several properties for the AggregateRating type to provide this information accurately. These properties describe the rating itself and the item being rated.

The `itemReviewed` property specifies the product, service, or content that is being rated. The `ratingValue` property indicates the actual rating for the content, while `bestRating` defines the highest value allowed in the rating system. For example, in a 5-star system, `bestRating` would be 5.

Additionally, at least one of two count properties is required: `ratingCount` for the total number of ratings, or `reviewCount` for the total number of reviews. When specifying numerical values for ratings, Schema.org states that a period ('.') must be used to indicate a decimal point, not a comma.

What types of content can use AggregateRating?

AggregateRating structured data is primarily used to enhance the appearance of search results by providing customer reviews and ratings. Google specifically mentions its application for product pages, where it can display review ratings. This is particularly useful for product pages where users cannot directly purchase the product, often referred to as product snippets.

While a review snippet, which often uses AggregateRating, is generally a short excerpt or average rating from a review website, the underlying `itemReviewed` property is broad. Google's documentation for Product Structured Data mentions that this broader markup has more options for specifying review information, such as pros and cons on an editorial product review page. However, for AggregateRating specifically, Google's documentation focuses on product-related contexts for displaying rich results with star ratings.

What are common mistakes to avoid?

When implementing AggregateRating structured data, it is crucial to ensure that the review content you mark up is readily available and visible to users on the marked-up page. Google emphasizes that the information provided in structured data should reflect what users can see and interact with directly on the page.

Another important guideline from Google is to avoid aggregating reviews or ratings from other websites. The reviews and ratings should originate from or be directly associated with the content on your page.

When validating your structured data, the Rich Results Test may highlight common errors. These include providing a value of the wrong type for a field, such as text where a number is expected. Another common issue is a "Duplicate unique property" error, which occurs when you provide two definitions for a property that should only have one within your structured data object.

How do you test AggregateRating structured data?

After adding structured data to your page, Google recommends validating your code using the Rich Results Test. This tool helps you check if your structured data is correctly implemented and eligible for special features in Google Search results. You submit the full URL of the page you want to test.

The Rich Results Test supports structured data in JSON-LD, RDFa, and Microdata formats. The test will show which rich result types were found on the page, along with any errors or suggestions for your structured data. If errors or warnings appear, you can expand the individual item to see details and click the description to open the code explorer at the corresponding location for easier debugging.

It is important to note that the page must be crawlable by Google for the test to work. If Google is prevented from crawling the page, for example, by a `robots.txt` rule or a `noindex` directive, the page cannot be tested with this tool. Fixing any critical errors identified by the test is essential for your structured data to be considered valid.

Common questions