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Google Changes Recipe Structured Data Guidance

Google’s prescription structured data requirements have changed. The old structured data method is no longer valid and Google requires that the structured recipe data be updated according to the latest requirements.

Structured data recipe

Structured data attributes are information that publishers pass on to search engines like Google to help them better understand your content. Structured data also allows Google to display content in attractive ways that draw attention to recipes called recipe improvements.

Typical recipe improvements are:

  • How-to recipes
  • Host pie recipe

Using valid structured data is important. Failure to use the correct structured data may result in the site losing eligibility to appear in recipe optimizations and subsequent loss of search engine traffic to other sites using the correct structured data.

Three structured data properties of the recipe have been changed

Google’s documentation states that they removed their guidelines for specifying a date range for the cookTime and prepTime properties.

The following syntax has been removed from the cookTime property recommendation:

“You can use min and max as child elements to specify a date range.”

The following syntax has been removed from the prepTime property:

“You can use min and max as child elements to specify a date range.”

Google now only supports exact time for cookTime, prepTime, and other properties not documented by Google.

The date range is no longer supported.

The changelog for the update shows the following:

Currently, the only supported method is exact time; date ranges are not supported. If you currently specify a date range and want Google to better understand your time values ​​for cook time and prep time, we recommend that you update this value in your structured data to a single value (eg, “cookTime”: “PT30M”)).

A third organization’s data property has been changed

Google’s changelog documentation states that only two properties have been changed, the cookTime and prepTime properties.

However, a third characteristic has also changed.

This is what the changelog says:

“Guidelines about setting a range for the cookTime and prepTime properties in the recipe documentation have been removed.”

Although Google’s changelog documentation doesn’t mention this, the totalTime property has also changed.

The previous documentation for totalTime Recipe states:

“You can use min and max as child elements to specify a date range.”

Here is a screenshot of the January 4, 2022 documents:

previous totalTime recommendation

The new documentation completely ignores the above date range recommendation.

New totalTime recommendation

New structured data for total time recipe

So, although Google’s documentation omitted to mention the change in the totalTime property, it would probably be wise to note that this property has changed as well and move forward to not including a date range for the totalTime property since Google no longer recommends it.

Structured data recipe

Many recipe sites rely on plugins for their structured data. If you’re using a recipe structured data plugin that also uses the date range, it can be helpful to update your existing plugin to the latest version to make sure your recipe structured data is up to date.

This structured data change is very new, and it was updated on January 18, 2022.

quotes

Google Changelog – See January 2022

Google Recipe Structured Data Page January 4, 2022

Google Recipe Current Structured Data page

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