Google bug cause reviews to drop out of local listings

If you noticed that your local business listing on Google is showing fewer reviews, you are not alone. Since Friday, tons of reviews have been disappearing from the local listings within Google Search and Google Maps.

More details. On Friday, I reported on the issue on the Search Engine Roundtable, not knowing if it was a bug or a feature. I noticed dozens and dozens of complaint threads popping up in the Google Business Profiles forums from concerned small businesses and local SEOs.

Some businesses say they lost only a few reviews, while others say they lost dozens of positive reviews.

Some say the count of reviews is not adding up and the reviews themselves are not missing.

Likely a bug. Joy Hawkins, a local SEO and Google top contributor, later said this is a bug that Google is working to fix.

Why we care. If you noticed that you lost a lot of reviews on your local listing, you should know that you are not alone. It seems to be impacting many Google Business Profile listings and hopefully Google will restore those reviews soon.

Google has not commented on the issue.

Update – Google comment. Victoria Kroll from Google posted a statement in the forums saying:

We’re aware of an issue affecting some Google Business Profiles, causing some profiles to show lower-than-actual review counts due to a display issue. The reviews themselves have not actually been removed. We’re working hard to resolve this and restore accurate review counts as quickly as possible. We appreciate your patience and will share updates on this thread as they become available.

Before reporting missing reviews, please note that there are several reasons why reviews may be removed from maps. Usually, missing reviews are removed for policy violations like spam or inappropriate content. Read more about our Review policy guidelines here before proceeding. You can also refer to the Help Center Article for more information.