By Sara Guaglione
Publication Date: 2026-01-15 05:01:00
Top U.S. news publishers lose search visibility
For years, big publishers treated Google as a distribution utility: publish a lot, cover everything and let domain authority do the rest. The December core update — rolled out Dec. 11–29 — is another sign that bargain is breaking. In multiple readouts, volatility hit news hard, and the sites that appear to be holding up best are those that behave less like general-interest news hubs and more like “the best answer” engines.
“A lot of the offshore, low-credibility news sites that randomly surged over the past year are gone. They grabbed visibility without earning trust, and this update looks like a long-overdue quality correction,” said Michael King, founder and CEO of a content marketing and SEO agency iPullRank.
Analysis by Aleyda Solís, international SEO consultant and founder at Orainti, found that sites with narrow, category-specific…
