What you need to know going forward • Yoast

SEO hasn’t stood still in 2025. It hasn’t reinvented itself either. It has been made clear what really matters. If you’ve been following The SEO Update by Yoast monthly webinars this year, you’ll see the pattern. Throughout 2025, our Chief SEOs Carolyn Shelby and Alex Moss explained not only what was changing, but why it mattered as AI-powered search transformed visibility, trust, and performance. If you missed some sessions or want the full overview in one place, this summary is for you. We look back at how SEO has evolved over the year, what these changes mean in practice, and what they mean for the future.

SEO in 2025: Monthly Overview

Month	Important developments	Core competencies
January	AI-powered, personalized search accelerated. Zero-click results increased. Brand signals, EEAT, performance and schema have shifted from optimizations to requirements.	SEO has expanded from ranking pages to showcasing trusted brands that machines can understand.
February	Massive investments in AI infrastructure. AI overviews led to a decline in organic results. Traffic declined while brand influence and sales remained stable.	SEO results can no longer be measured by traffic alone. Authority and influence are more important than mere clicks.
march	AI overviews expanded as clicks decreased. Brand mentions appeared to play a larger role in AI-driven citation and selection behavior than links alone. Search behavior increased despite fewer referrals.	Visibility is broken across systems. Trust and brand recognition became the differentiators for inclusion.
April	Schema and structure proved essential for AI interpretation. Multimodal and personalized search expanded. Zero-click behavior has continued to increase.	SEO shifted from optimization to interpretation. Clarity and structure determine reuse.
May	The discovery spread beyond Google. AI overviews have achieved mass adoption. Quotes replaced visits as signals of success.	SEO has grown beyond the SERP. Presence across platforms and AI systems became crucial.
June – July	AI mode became the core of search. Ads entered AI answers. Indexing alone no longer provides guaranteed visibility. The reporting fell short of reality.	Traditional SEO remained necessary but inadequate. Resilience and adaptability became essential.
August	Visibility without value became a real risk. SEO needed to tie exposure to results that went beyond the number of sessions.	Visibility without value became a real risk. SEO needed to link presence to results beyond sessions.
September	AI mode is approaching standard status. Legal, licensing and attribution pressure increased. Persona-based strategies became more important.	Control over visibility is no longer guaranteed. Trust and credibility are the only lasting benefits.
October	Search Console data reset expectations. AI quotes dominated the rankings. AI search became the goal.	SEO success depends on presence in AI systems, not just SERP positions.
November	AI mode became the core of search. Ads entered AI answers. Indexing alone no longer guarantees visibility. The reporting fell short of reality.	Clarity and structure go above and beyond. The authority decides on admission.
December	SEO has completely moved to retrieval-based logic. AI systems extracted answers, not pages. EEAT acted as gatekeeper.	SEO evolved into visibility management for AI-driven search. Precision replaced volume.

January: SEO enters the age of representation

January set the tone for the year. Not through a single disruptive update, but through a clear signal that SEO is moving away from pure rankings and towards something broader. Search became increasingly more personalized, AI-driven and selective in the sources displayed. Visibility was no longer guaranteed just because you were ranked well.

Read: Perfect Prompts: 10 Tips for AI-Driven SEO Content Creation

It was already clear at the beginning of the year that SEO in 2025 would reward brands that were trustworthy, technically sound, and easy for machines to understand.

What changed in January

Here are a few clear trends that began to shape how SEO works in practice:

• AI-powered search became more personalized: Search results reflected context more clearly, taking location, intent, and behavior into account. The same query no longer returned the same result for every user
• Zero-click searches accelerated: More answers appeared directly in search results, reducing the need to click through, especially for informational and local searches
• Brand signals and reviews gained weight: Search relied more heavily on real-world trust indicators like brand mentions, reviews, and overall reputation
• EEAT became harder to ignore: Clear specialist knowledge, personal responsibility and credibility increasingly functioned as filters and not just as quality guidelines
• The role of the schema began to change: Structured data was less about visual enhancement and more about helping machines understand content and entities

What you can take with you from January

January wasn’t about tactics. It was about direction.

SEO began to reward clarity over cleverness. Brands across pages. Trust comes before volume. Performance instead of polish. If search engines were to aggregate, compare, and respond on your behalf, you would need to make it easy for them to understand who you are, what you offer, and why you are credible.

This theme did not fade as the year progressed. It became the basis for everything that followed.

Watch the full recording of the Yoast SEO Update – January 2025 Edition webinar.

February: Size, money and AI made change inevitable

While January showed where search was going, February showed how serious the industry was about getting there. This was the month where AI stopped feeling like a layer on top of search and started looking like the foundation underneath.

Huge investments, changing SERP layouts, and changing performance metrics all pointed to the same conclusion. Search has been redesigned for an AI-first world.

What changed in February

As the month went on, the signs became increasingly difficult to ignore.

• AI overviews have pushed organic results further down: AI overviews appeared in a large proportion of problem solving queries, favoring authoritative sources and summaries over traditional organic listings
• Traffic decreased while brand value increased: Well-known examples showed that sessions fell despite increasing revenue. Visibility, influence and brand trust became more important than just meetings
• AI recommendations started increasing: Referral traffic from AI tools increased while Google’s overall market share began to show signs of pressure. Discovery began to spread across systems, not just search engines

What you can take with you from February

In February, the direction of January felt permanent.

When AI systems operate at this scale, they change the way visibility works. Rankings still mattered, but they no longer told the whole story. Authority, brand awareness and trust increasingly influenced whether content was shown, summarized or ignored.

The takeaway was clear. SEO could no longer just be measured by traffic. It needed to be understood in terms of influence, representation and relevance in a growing search ecosystem.

Watch the full discussion in the webinar recording, “The SEO Update by Yoast – February 2025 Edition.”

March: Visibility collapsed, trust became a differentiator

By March, the impact of AI-driven search was no longer theoretical. The conversation shifted from how search was changing to who was affected and why.

This was the month when declining clicks, citation gaps and publishing backlogs made one thing clear. Search visibility became fragmented across systems and trust became the deciding factor in who remained visible.

What changed in March

Developments in March added pressure to trends that had already emerged earlier in the year.

• AI overviews expanded while clicks decreased: Studies showed that AI overviews appeared more frequently while click-through rates continued to decline. Visibility increasingly ended at the SERP
• Brand mentions were more important than links alone: Citation patterns varied across AI platforms, but one signal remained consistent. Brands mentioned frequently and clearly were more likely to appear
• Search behavior continued to increase despite fewer clicks: Overall search volume increased year over year, showing that users weren’t searching less; They just clicked less
• AI search had issues with attribution and citations: Many AI-powered results did not consistently cite sources, highlighting the need for strong brand recognition rather than relying on direct recommendations
• Search experiences have become more fragmented: New entry points such as “Circle to Search” and premium AI modes led to additional levels of discovery, especially among younger users
• Structured signals were developed for AI retrieval: Updates to Robots meta tags, return policy structured data, and “sufficient context” signals showed that search engines are refining the way content is selected and anchored

Also read: Structured data with schema for search and AI

What you can take with you from March

March exposed the tensions at the heart of modern search engine optimization.

Search demand increased, but traditional traffic decreased. AI systems answered more questions, but often without clear attribution. In this environment, being a recognizable and trustworthy brand was more important than being the most optimized site.

The implication was simple. SEO was no longer just about earning clicks. It was about gaining inclusion, recognition and trust in systems that don’t always send users back.

Watch the full recording of Yoast’s The SEO Update – March 2025 Edition.

April: Machines begin to decide how content is interpreted

In April the focus shifted again. The question was no longer whether AI would shape search, but rather how machines would decide what content meant and when to display it.

After March uncovered visibility gaps and attribution issues, April focused on interpretation. How AI systems read, classify and extract information became central to SEO results.

What changed in April

April brought clarity about how modern search systems process content.

• Schema has proven its value beyond rankings: Microsoft has confirmed that schema markup helps large language models understand content. Bing Copilot used structured data to generate clearer and more reliable answers, reinforcing the role of schema in interpretation rather than visual enhancement
• AI-driven search became multimodal: Image-based queries have been enhanced by Google Lens and Gemini, allowing users to search using photos and images rather than just text
• AI overviews have been expanded during core updates: During Google’s core update in March, there was a noticeable increase in AI overviews, particularly for searches related to travel, entertainment, and local discovery
• Clicks decreased as summaries were improved: AI-generated content summaries reduced the need to click through and accelerated zero-click behavior in informational and decision-based searches
• The content structure was more important than specific optimizations: Clear headings that improve readability, lists, and semantic cues helped AI systems extract meaning. There were no shortcuts. Standard SEO best practices carried the weight

What you can take away from April

April shifted SEO from optimization to interpretation.

Search engines and AI systems weren’t just looking for relevance. They were looking for clarity. Well-structured, semantically clear, and real-world entity-based content was easier to understand, summarize, and reuse.

The lesson was subtle but important. No new tricks were needed for AI search. They needed content that was easier for machines to read and harder to misinterpret.

Want the full context? Watch the full webinar “The SEO Update by Yoast – April 2025 Edition”.

May: Discovery spreads beyond search engines

In May, it was no longer enough to discuss how search engines interpret content. The bigger question was where the discovery actually took place.

SEO began to expand beyond Google. Visibility has been fragmented across platforms, AI tools and ecosystems, forcing brands to think about presence rather than placement.

What changed in May

The month highlighted how search and discovery were becoming further decentralized.

• Search behavior has expanded beyond traditional search engines: Around 39% of consumers now use Pinterest as a search engine, with Generation Z leading the way in usage. Discovery increasingly occurred within platforms and not just through search bars
• AI overviews have achieved mass adoption: AI Overviews reportedly reached around 1.5 billion users per month and appeared in around 13% of searches, with informational queries accounting for most of this growth
• The number of clicks continued to be replaced by quotes: As AI summaries became more common, being referenced or cited became more important than driving a visit, especially for queries at the top of the funnel
• AI-powered search, diversified across different tools: Chat-based search experiences added shopping, comparison and personalization features, moving discovery further away from traditional results pages
• Economic pressure on content ecosystems has increased: Industry voices warned that widespread zero-click responses would weaken incentives for content creation across the web
• Trust signals have been subjected to stricter scrutiny: Updated review guidelines targeted fake authority, misleading design patterns, and artificial credibility

What you can take with you from May

Maybe SEO has been redefined as a visibility problem rather than a traffic problem.

When discovery occurs across platforms, summaries, and AI systems, success depends on how clearly your content conveys meaning, credibility, and relevance. Rankings were still important, but they were no longer the primary measure of success.

The message was clear. SEO had outgrown the SERP. Brands that focused on authenticity, semantic clarity and structured information were better positioned to remain visible in the next search.

Watch the full webinar “The SEO Update by Yoast – May 2025 Edition” to see all the insights in context.

June and July: SEO adapted to AI-first search

As summer began, SEO entered a more unpleasant phase. Visibility was still important, but control over how and where content was displayed became increasingly limited.

June and July were about adaptation. Search moved closer to AI assistants, ads were integrated into answers, and traditional SEO signals no longer guaranteed presence on all search interfaces.

What changed in June and July

This period brought some of the most significant operational changes of the year.

• AI mode became a premium search experience: AI mode was rolled out more broadly, including incognito use, and began to be integrated into core search experiences. Search was no longer just results. These were discussions, summaries and follow-ups
• Show entered AI-generated answers: Google has introduced ads in AI Overviews and started testing them in conversational AI mode. Visibility now not only competes with other pages, but also with monetized answers
• The measurement fell short of reality: AI Mode data verified by Search Console would be included in performance reports, but without separate filters or APIs. Visibility was changing faster than reporting tools could keep up.
• The quotes followed platform-specific preferences: Different AI systems preferred different sources. Some relied heavily on encyclopedic content, others on community-driven platforms, making it clear that one SEO strategy would not fit every system
• Most AI-linked pages still rank well organically: Around 97% of URLs referenced in AI mode landed in the top 10 organic results, showing that strong traditional SEO was still a requirement, even if it was no longer enough
• The content had to resist a summary: Leaks and testing showed that some AI tools rarely showed links unless a live search was triggered. Generic, easy-to-summarize modern content was easier to replace
• Infrastructure became an SEO problem again: AI agents increased crawling and request volumes and brought performance, caching, and server readiness back into focus
• The search has moved beyond text: Voice-based interactions, audio summaries, image-driven queries, and AI-first browsers expanded the way users searched and consumed information

What to take with you in June and July

This time forced a rethink.

SEO could no longer assume that ranking, indexing, or even traffic guaranteed visibility. AI systems decide when to summarize, when to cite, and when to skip pages entirely. Ads, assistants, and alternative interfaces are now more common than ever between users and websites.

The conclusion was pragmatic. Strong fundamentals were still important, but they were not the goal. SEO now requires resilience: content that has authority, resists oversimplification, loads quickly, and remains relevant even when clicks don’t follow.

At the end of July one thing was clear. SEO didn’t disappear. The operation faced new constraints, and the rest of the year would test how well the teams could adapt to them.

Missed a meeting? You can watch the full recording of The SEO Update by Yoast – June 2025 Edition here.

August: The gap between visibility and value widened

In August, SEO teams faced a growing discrepancy. Visibility increased, but traditional results were harder to attribute to it.

This was the month when the mechanics of AI-driven search became more transparent and inconvenient.

What changed in August

August brought to light the operational realities behind AI-powered discovery.

• Impressions increased while clicks continued to decrease: AI overviews dominated results and increased exposure without generating traffic. In some cases, conversions still improved, but attribution became harder to prove
• The “great decoupling” became measurable: Visibility and performance are no longer in sync. SEO teams saw an increase in impressions despite a decrease in sessions
• Zero-click searches have been further accelerated: No-click behavior increased to 69%, showing that many user journeys now ended within search interfaces
• AI traffic remained small but influential: AI-driven referrals still accounted for less than 1% of traffic on most websites, but they shaped expectations for responses, speed, and convenience
• The retrieval logic shifted toward context and intent: New retrieval approaches prioritized meaning, relationships, and query context over keyword match

Must Read: On-SERP SEO can help you combat zero-click results

What you can take with you from August

August made one thing inevitable.

It confirmed the reality that SEO could no longer rely on traffic as the primary proof of value. Visibility still mattered, but only when paired with results that could survive reduced clicks and fuzzy attribution.

The lessons were strategic. SEO had to link visibility to conversion, brand lift or long-term trust, not just sessions. Otherwise it would be increasingly difficult to defend its effectiveness.

Didn’t see the live session? You can still watch the full webinar “The SEO Update by Yoast – August 2025 Edition”.

September: Control, attribution and trust were renegotiated

September pushed the conversation further. It was no longer just about declining clicks. It was about who controls discovery, attribution and access to content.

This was the month when legal, technical and strategic constraints collided.

What changed in September

In September, SEO underwent a realignment in terms of governance and credibility.

• AI mode is getting closer to default: Search experiences shifted to AI-driven responses with conversational follow-ups and multimodal input
• The demise of the open web has been publicly acknowledged: Court filings and public statements confirmed what many publishers already felt. Traditional web traffic was under structural pressure
• The legal review has been intensified: High-profile settlements and lawsuits highlighted the growing challenges surrounding training data, aggregations, and lost revenue
• Licensing came into the SEO conversation: New machine-readable licensing approaches emerged as early attempts to restore control and consent
• Snippet visibility became a gateway signal: AI tools relied heavily on search snippets for real-time answers, making concise, extractable content more important
• Persona-based strategies have gained traction: SEO began to shift from keyword targeting to people-driven content, modeled on the way AI systems infer intent
• Confidence in generic, formulaic AI writing styles is waning: Formulaic, overly sophisticated AI content raised credibility concerns and increased the need for editorial judgment
• Measuring tools lost stability again: Changes to search parameters disrupted rank tracking and reminded teams that SEO reporting would remain volatile

What you can take with you from September

September forced SEO to grow up again.

Control over visibility, attribution and content usage was no longer guaranteed. Trust, clarity and credibility became the only lasting advantages in an ecosystem dominated by AI intermediaries.

The takeaway was sobering but useful. SEO could still drive value, but only if it is aligned with real user needs, strong brand signals, and content that deserves its place in AI-driven responses.

Want to dig a little deeper? Watch the full webinar “The SEO Update by Yoast – September 2025 Edition.”

October: AI search became a target

October marked a turning point in the interpretation of SEO performance. The data didn’t just shift. It completely reset expectations.

This was the month that SEO teams had to accept that AI-powered search was no longer a layer above results. It became the place where the search ended.

What changed in October

October brought clarity, even if the numbers looked uncomfortable.

• AI mode has changed user behavior: AI agents are now involved in around a third of search queries, with most sessions taking place within AI panels. Clicks became the exception rather than the standard
• AI citations increasingly competed with rankings: Visibility increasingly depended on whether content was selected, summarized or cited by AI systems, rather than where it was placed
• Search engines optimized for ideas, not pages: Evidence from search platforms confirmed that AI systems extract concepts and answers, not entire URLs
• Metadata has lost some direct control: Tests of AI-generated meta descriptions found that manual optimization would have less impact on content display
• Commerce and search continue to merge: AI-driven shopping experiences increased, indicating that transaction intent is increasingly being conducted through AI interfaces

What you can take with you from October

In October, SEO was redefined as presence within AI systems.

Traffic was still important, but it was no longer the primary outcome. The real question was whether your content even showed up in AI-driven responses. Clarity, structure and extractability replaced traditional ranking gains as the most reliable levers.

From this point on, SEO had to look at AI search as a goal and not just a gateway.

November: Structure and credibility decide on inclusion

If October shattered expectations, November showed what actually worked.

This month has narrowed the gap between theory and practice. It became clearer why some content consistently appeared in the AI ​​results while other content disappeared.

What changed in November

November focused on how AI systems select and trust sources.

• Structured content outperformed clever content: Clear headings, predictable formats, and direct answers made it easier for AI systems to extract and reuse information
• Schema supported understanding, not visibility alone: Structured data remained valuable, but only when paired with clean, readable content on the page
• AI-driven shopping and comparison accelerates: The quality, consistency and accessibility of product data directly influenced whether brands appeared in AI-powered decision-making processes
• Citation pools remained selective: AI systems relied on a relatively small number of trusted sources, underscoring the importance of brand awareness and authority
• Search tools have focused on topics rather than keywords: Grouped queries and topic-based insights replaced single-keyword performance views

What you can take with you from November

November made one thing clear. SEO wasn’t about producing more content or optimizing more. The idea was to make content easier to understand and harder to ignore.

Clarity beats creativity. Structural beat scale. The authority determined whether content was even reused.

This month quietly reaffirmed the fundamentals that will define SEO in the future.

For a full breakdown, check out the full recording of The SEO Update by Yoast – October and November 2025 Edition.

December: SEO switches from ranking to retrieval

December brought together the whole year.

Instead of introducing new disruptions, it clarified what 2025 was always aiming for. SEO was no longer primarily about ranking pages. It was about making retrieval possible.

What changed in December

The annual review highlighted the new reality of SEO.

• Search systems retrieved answers, not pages: AI-driven search experiences pulled snippets, definitions, and summaries instead of directing users to full articles
• Literal language was still important: Despite advances in understanding, AI systems have relied heavily on accurate formulations. The choice of terminology had a direct impact on the research
• The content structure became mandatory: Front-loaded answers, short paragraphs, lists, and clear sections made content usable for AI systems
• Relevance replaced ranking as the core signal: The clearest, most contextually relevant answer was more important than traditional ranking factors
• EEAT acted as gatekeeper: Recognized expertise, authorship, and trust signals determined whether content was suitable for reuse
• Authority reduced AI errors: Strong credibility signals helped AI systems select more reliable sources and reduce hallucinated responses

What you can take with you from December

December did not declare the end of SEO. It defined his next phase.

SEO evolved into visibility management for AI-driven systems. Success depended on clarity, credibility and structure, not shortcuts or volume. The basics still worked, but only if they were applied with discipline.

The direction was clear by the end of 2025. SEO hasn’t gotten smaller. It became more precise.

Missed a meeting? You can watch the full recording of The SEO Update by Yoast – December 2025 Edition here.

SEO evolved into visibility management for AI-driven search. Precision replaced volume.

2025 hasn’t rewritten SEO. It cleared it up.

Search has shifted from ranking pages to getting answers. From rewarding volume to rewarding clarity. From clicks to credibility. And from optimization tricks to system-level understanding.

The basics are still important. Technical soundness, helpful content, and strong SEO fundamentals are non-negotiable. But they are no longer the finish line. What separates visible brands from invisible ones today is how clearly their content can be understood, trusted and reused by AI-driven search systems.

In 2026, the goal is not to outsmart search engines. It’s about making your expertise distinctive. Write for people, structure for machines, and build authority that endures even when clicks fail.

SEO hasn’t gotten smaller this year. It became more precise. Stay with us to find out what happens next in the search in 2026.