YMYL (Your Money or Your Life) describes topics where inaccurate or misleading content could harm people. Google’s documentation names topics that could significantly affect health, financial stability or safety, or the welfare or well-being of society. The term originates in Google’s Search Quality Rater Guidelines, which instruct human raters who evaluate search quality.
Which topics count as YMYL?
The rater guidelines give examples such as the symptoms of a heart attack, how to invest money, what to do in an earthquake, who can vote and the qualifications needed for a driver’s license. The current version (September 11, 2025) judges YMYL by the type of harm a topic could cause and names four areas: health or safety, financial security, government, civics and society, and other harm to people or society.
What does YMYL mean for SEO?
Google states that E-E-A-T is not a single ranking factor. Its systems use a mix of signals to identify helpful, reliable content, and Google says trust matters most. For topics where low-quality content could do real harm, Google says these signals carry more weight.
Raters do not set rankings. Their assessments are used to evaluate whether Google’s systems produce good results.
For site owners, common practice is to cite sources, name authors and reviewers with their qualifications, and keep content up to date. Google’s documentation mentions such points in the context of E-E-A-T. It does not prescribe them as requirements for YMYL pages.
Example
An article that explains the symptoms of a heart attack could cause harm if it is wrong, so it is a YMYL topic. A pancake recipe is not.
FAQ
What does YMYL stand for? Your Money or Your Life. It covers topics that can affect health, finances, safety or society.
What are the YMYL categories? Health, finance, safety and civic or societal topics are the core areas named across sources. The rater guidelines name four areas: health or safety, financial security, government, civics and society, and other.
Is YMYL a ranking factor? Google describes it as a concept used in the rater guidelines and does not list it as a ranking factor.
Sources
- Creating helpful, reliable, people-first content – Google Search Centraldevelopers.google.com
- General Guidelines (Search Quality Rater Guidelines), section 2.3 YMYL, September 11, 2025 – Googlestatic.googleusercontent.com
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