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​Google's December 2025 core update begins rolling out. As is tradition, Google announces their latest core update just in time for Christmas. The rollout began on 11th December 2025 and may take up to 3 weeks to complete.

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​Google introduces social channels in Google Search Console. This allows users to find clicks, impressions and trending data in the GSC Insights report. This is rolling out for a limited number of sites but may expand in the future.

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​Google increases the number of inline links in AI Mode. This update includes a slight redesign of the link previews to highlight them more clearly. This, in theory, should increase CTR for links in AI Mode.

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​Google rolls out Preferred Sources globally and adds 'Spotlighting subscriptions' feature. The Spotlighting feature allows you to prioritise your favourite publishers in a dedicated carousel.

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​OpenAI quietly builds an index of webpages and search results. From the Web Search Tool API documentation, it seems that ChatGPT Search uses cached/indexed results for certain answers.

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​Google Labs launches Disco, an experimental way to build workflows in your browser. Disco's first feature is GenTabs which can take your open tabs and align them to specific goals you have in mind.

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​Google upgrades Live with Search to include Gemini's latest Native Audio. This allows Search Live to respond with a more natural-sounding, expressive voice when providing answers or tips to the user.

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Welcome to the PageRank, pal

Google still uses a modified version of PageRank, LLMs have been buying link graph data and it's *still* hugely important for ranking documents. 📄

🧙‍♂️ PageRank rarely gets talked about now, but it is still fundamental in understanding the underlying concepts of how search engines think about relationships between pages.

🎙️ IMO all SEOs should understand the fundamentals of PageRank. I've included an overview of "Method For Node Ranking in a Linked Database" AKA PageRank in our SEO Patent Podcast, so you can get an easy to listen overview of how it importance scores to documents based on the quantity and quality of links pointing to them, essentially a recursive system where a link from a highly-ranked page carries more weight.

Come out to the coast, we'll get a migration, change a few titles

As tempting as it may be, I would not alter page titles if possible during a site migration.

It's helpful to change as few things as possible to get a clearer view of if there are issues.

It's likely there will be opportunities you can take advantage of, but doing them in a linear fashion will usually provide the clearest route to success.

Now I know what a CSS feels like

DYK your CSS can affect how much PageRank passes through a link? 💡

Does it sound like I'm redirecting my https?

Having an HSTS-enabled site means that browsers won't even try and access the non-https version, you'll simply see a "307" redirect (which is done locally by the browser).

This can be tricky if you're trying to diagnose issues. You can actually use Screaming Frog to test what is happening behind the 307 redirects by disabling "Respect HSTS" policy in Configuration > Spider > Advanced 💡

Ho ho ho, I have a core update

Google’s December 2025 Core Update has started rolling out, and may take 3 weeks to complete. May the odds ever be in your favour! 🪄

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🥇 MJ Cachón Yáñez (LinkedIn / Bluesky)

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