It’s been a crazy year for SEO. This year’s analysis of Google winners and losers shows significantly greater fluctuations than in previous years. Which U.S. websites successfully rode the wave? And which sites took a nose dive? Also, what impact did the year’s two major Google Core Updates — June/July and November — have on Google.com rankings? Read on to find out who made our lists.
Google’s 2021 loser is Pinterest, while Instagram comes out top in 2021
If Google were to have a social network award, it would most certainly have gone to Instagram in 2021. In absolute terms, Instagram achieved an unprecedented rise in SEO visibility in our index for Google.com. For its competitor Pinterest it was all downhill. Pinterest was one of the biggest losers in 2021. This trend is the same across all the countries we analyzed. Instagram seems to be getting a lot right, while Pinterest seems to have fallen out of favor with Google.
Google Update Rally: Many of 2020’s losers made the 2021 winners lists
Google giveth and Google taketh away. One of the negative trends seen in the past few years is clusters of websites being penalized by the updates. Yet then the algorithm is revised and previous losers are back on top. For example, we identified this trend in some of the music and podcast sites we analyzed. While iheart.com, last.fm, and rateyourmusic.com were among the biggest losers in the May 2020 Core Update, the July 2021 Core Update gave these sites a boost right through December. This meant they ended 2021 with a clear increase in SEO visibility compared to pre-2020 levels.
Google Update of the Year 2021: Core November Update
Google’s Core Update November 2021 also drew some ire from the SEO community when it launched in the strongest sales period of the year: Thanksgiving and Black Friday. Now we are seeing how this core update positively impacted the SEO visibility of many websites, much to their delight. Here’s what the visibility histories of Google U.S. domains in eCommerce and reference sites look like when Google’s algorithm is feeling really, really generous:
The Top 100 Google winners of 2021
Google’s 2021 winners came from a wide variety of different sectors. While previous years saw some ups and downs in dictionaries, health and finance, the patterns in 2021 are much more diverse. The following are examples from various sectors that made the 2021 list of Google US winners:
- E-commerce: Among the big players in eCommerce that won in overall visibility on Google are walmart.com, bestbuy.com, target.com, and nordstrom.com.
- Education: The pandemic had a positive effect on the rankings of education and learning platforms such as kidadl.com, cuemath.com, and study.com, which saw a huge surge in SEO visibility.
- Entertainment: Numerous portals from the streaming, music, and games sectors ended up Google winners in 2021 — most certainly due to increased demand resulting from the pandemic. These include discogs.com, last.fm, gameforge.com, and twitch.tv.
- Publishers: Following losses in 2020, many publishers enjoyed a very good year on the visibility front in 2021. These include parade.com, nypost.com, and the-sun.com, for example.
Top 100 Google Winners in 2021
Rank | Domain | SEO Visibility Increase (absolute) | SEO Visibility Increase in % |
1 | instagram.com | 2,729,198 | 37% |
2 | google.com | 2,293,239 | 22% |
3 | imdb.com | 2,131,250 | 26% |
4 | britannica.com | 1,921,200 | 36% |
5 | merriam-webster.com | 1,761,595 | 34% |
6 | facebook.com | 1,365,968 | 8% |
7 | spotify.com | 1,086,469 | 98% |
8 | linkedin.com | 1,051,784 | 22% |
9 | apple.com | 1,005,355 | 19% |
10 | tvtropes.org | 829,527 | 340% |
11 | rottentomatoes.com | 730,277 | 30% |
12 | walmart.com | 718,040 | 36% |
13 | mayoclinic.org | 626,616 | 29% |
14 | collinsdictionary.com | 556,302 | 78% |
15 | yelp.com | 527,510 | 46% |
16 | clevelandclinic.org | 526,699 | 95% |
17 | dictionary.com | 511,006 | 13% |
18 | tvguide.com | 506,692 | 128% |
19 | people.com | 471,881 | 64% |
20 | parade.com | 469,862 | 153% |
21 | nordstrom.com | 461,831 | 183% |
22 | bestbuy.com | 448,982 | 47% |
23 | usmagazine.com | 414,745 | 126% |
24 | target.com | 402,730 | 33% |
25 | biography.com | 355,984 | 33% |
26 | fandom.com | 352,046 | 9% |
27 | reddit.com | 348,359 | 38% |
28 | nytimes.com | 347,406 | 12% |
29 | nypost.com | 347,039 | 119% |
30 | quora.com | 332,161 | 104% |
31 | discogs.com | 293,185 | 61% |
32 | usnews.com | 292,399 | 18% |
33 | iheart.com | 279,134 | 94% |
34 | last.fm | 274,389 | 222% |
35 | twitter.com | 265,920 | 6% |
36 | lifewire.com | 265,094 | 66% |
37 | makeuseof.com | 254,155 | 243% |
38 | tvinsider.com | 253,424 | 310% |
39 | eonline.com | 250,651 | 92% |
40 | live.com | 240,375 | 39% |
41 | cambridge.org | 223,970 | 15% |
42 | yahoo.com | 219,348 | 8% |
43 | genius.com | 217,794 | 19% |
44 | steampowered.com | 215,714 | 32% |
45 | gameforge.com | 213,267 | 457% |
46 | softonic.com | 200,311 | 41% |
47 | the-sun.com | 198,729 | 207% |
48 | foursquare.com | 196,478 | 410% |
49 | hulu.com | 195,889 | 41% |
50 | tiktok.com | 193,489 | 741% |
51 | rateyourmusic.com | 189,835 | 252% |
52 | rollingstone.com | 186,778 | 33% |
53 | looper.com | 177,179 | 346% |
54 | foxsports.com | 171,816 | 75% |
55 | si.com | 170,282 | 85% |
56 | everydayhealth.com | 166,050 | 100% |
57 | rd.com | 165,214 | 80% |
58 | sciencedirect.com | 165,041 | 28% |
59 | brainyquote.com | 163,492 | 72% |
60 | fandango.com | 159,149 | 84% |
61 | thefamouspeople.com | 154,096 | 444% |
62 | reuters.com | 154,092 | 44% |
63 | state.gov | 153,301 | 42% |
64 | themoviedb.org | 152,857 | 3916% |
65 | pagesix.com | 150,553 | 88% |
66 | justwatch.com | 149,872 | 247% |
67 | thesaurus.com | 147,898 | 15% |
68 | nih.gov | 145,671 | 8% |
69 | twitch.tv | 144,074 | 143% |
70 | crazygames.com | 143,799 | 36% |
71 | wikihow.com | 141,482 | 44% |
72 | downdetector.com | 134,620 | 48% |
73 | digitaltrends.com | 129,818 | 49% |
74 | kidshealth.org | 127,494 | 33% |
75 | vox.com | 126,984 | 50% |
76 | shutterstock.com | 126,623 | 39% |
77 | thepioneerwoman.com | 121,883 | 145% |
78 | kidadl.com | 121,317 | 10679% |
79 | study.com | 121,192 | 103% |
80 | mapquest.com | 117,769 | 18% |
81 | goodreads.com | 116,845 | 14% |
82 | poshmark.com | 115,922 | 85% |
83 | seriouseats.com | 113,872 | 156% |
84 | gamespot.com | 112,333 | 78% |
85 | uptodown.com | 111,853 | 108% |
86 | foodnetwork.com | 110,460 | 16% |
87 | screenrant.com | 110,131 | 26% |
88 | istockphoto.com | 109,243 | 139% |
89 | alamy.com | 108,390 | 270% |
90 | homedepot.com | 106,706 | 10% |
91 | cuemath.com | 104,516 | 5749% |
92 | flickr.com | 104,375 | 218% |
93 | ca.gov | 102,691 | 16% |
94 | knowyourmeme.com | 101,743 | 125% |
95 | dailymail.co.uk | 100,905 | 38% |
96 | thoughtco.com | 100,362 | 34% |
97 | nfl.com | 98,786 | 22% |
98 | cornell.edu | 97,583 | 38% |
99 | aljazeera.com | 97,177 | 95% |
100 | couponcabin.com | 97,054 | 29% |
eCommerce 2021 – The Top 10 Google Winners:
Rank | Domain | SEO Visibility Increase (absolute) | SEO Visibility Increase in % |
1 | apple.com | 1,005,355 | 19% |
2 | walmart.com | 718,040 | 36% |
3 | nordstrom.com | 461,831 | 183% |
4 | bestbuy.com | 448,982 | 47% |
5 | target.com | 402,730 | 33% |
6 | homedepot.com | 106,706 | 10% |
7 | lowes.com | 84,023 | 17% |
8 | macys.com | 75,008 | 12% |
9 | costco.com | 72,790 | 34% |
10 | ikea.com | 71,533 | 48% |
The Biggest Google Losers of 2021
As always, in any given year there will also be Google losers. Here’s a look at some of the losers in 2021:
- Pinterest: For Pinterest, all the TLDs indexed in Google experienced losses in visibility in 2021, especially Pinterest’s primary domain, pinterest.com. It saw a significant drop in visibility in Google’s U.S. index. But all the other TLDs whose URLs rank in the U.S. index — pinterest.ca, pinterest.co.uk, pinterest.com.au, pinterest.es, or pinterest.ph, for example — also saw a loss in visibility. This trend not only applies to the U.S., however. The year was also bad for Pinterest SEO visibility in the Google SERPs in the UK and in Germany.
- E-A-T-Websites: As in previous years, there are some sectors with greater ups and downs than others. These includes E-A-T content about health and finance. Examples of losers this year include whattoexpect.com and healthgrades.com from the health sector and clark.com and citi.com from the finance sector. The algorithm seems to be testing domains at certain intervals — so, these sectors can’t afford to rest on their laurels.
Top 100 Google Losers in 2021
Domain | SEO Visibility Decrease (absolute) | SEO Visibility Decrease in % |
youtube.com | -1,210,931 | -20% |
pinterest.com | -971,779 | -22% |
tripadvisor.com | -688,904 | -35% |
healthline.com | -487,238 | -17% |
rakuten.com | -334,926 | -75% |
cia.gov | -239,641 | -95% |
vulture.com | -233,024 | -47% |
pinterest.ca | -228,587 | -81% |
bbb.org | -227,745 | -44% |
niche.com | -198,709 | -30% |
craigslist.org | -184,639 | -14% |
mashable.com | -157,401 | -52% |
thebalancecareers.com | -155,750 | -50% |
prnewswire.com | -151,466 | -39% |
gamestop.com | -126,488 | -33% |
clark.com | -124,219 | -57% |
whattoexpect.com | -119,794 | -44% |
globenewswire.com | -115,972 | -71% |
crunchbase.com | -109,641 | -11% |
theatlantic.com | -109,639 | -24% |
pinterest.co.uk | -105,445 | -81% |
popcornflix.com | -95,956 | -60% |
vimeo.com | -94,859 | -72% |
givingassistant.org | -93,868 | -45% |
mentalfloss.com | -93,482 | -40% |
patch.com | -90,977 | -53% |
cbs.com | -90,248 | -31% |
bing.com | -89,187 | -36% |
caranddriver.com | -88,885 | -20% |
savings.com | -88,474 | -48% |
whitepages.com | -86,705 | -29% |
freeform.com | -85,735 | -74% |
pinterest.com.au | -84,428 | -75% |
cuny.edu | -83,749 | -39% |
rxlist.com | -81,898 | -18% |
agame.com | -79,881 | -39% |
pinterest.es | -77,589 | -91% |
openculture.com | -76,013 | -79% |
hbr.org | -72,264 | -32% |
astrostyle.com | -72,082 | -85% |
healthgrades.com | -70,340 | -50% |
thecut.com | -69,171 | -45% |
muckrack.com | -66,385 | -29% |
yandex.com | -65,611 | -52% |
simon.com | -64,645 | -39% |
usc.edu | -64,091 | -49% |
consumeraffairs.com | -63,103 | -23% |
lifehacker.com | -60,545 | -56% |
pinterest.ph | -59,785 | -95% |
khanacademy.org | -58,885 | -19% |
springer.com | -58,688 | -58% |
penguinrandomhouse.com | -57,682 | -35% |
citi.com | -56,164 | -33% |
topcashback.com | -55,658 | -82% |