Google On Will They Ever Remove PageRank From The Google Toolbar?

Google’s head of search spam, Matt Cutts, posted a video on YouTube named Why don’t you turn off the PageRank feature in the Google Toolbar?

It is a very fair question, given Google has downplayed the importance of PageRank over the years. Google has:

• Removed PageRank scores from Google Webmaster Tools in October 2009.
• Google dropped the Google Toolbar for Firefox in 2011.
• Never made a Google Toolbar for Chrome, so PageRank scores never showed in that browser

In the video, Matt said the reason they still have it is not because SEOs use it but rather because searchers and users still use it to determine how “reputable” a web site is.

Matt then goes on to explain that Google’s own browser, Chrome, does not have PageRank built into it. Plus, IE 10 doesn’t allow add ons. So, he wouldn’t be surprised if the PageRank values in the toolbar go away by themselves. He said Google will continue to support it as long as users are using it.

However, Matt added that the “writing is on the wall” for this feature as more and more browsers come out and replace the older versions of the browser.

Here is that video:

For more on this topic, see our comprehensive Google PageRank article.