Law firm, dental and YMYL SEO
YMYL content guidelines for legal and health sites
Written by the Top SEO Experts Team
Reviewed by Siddharth GangalLast updated 18 min read
Quick answer
YMYL content guidelines are Google’s higher bar for pages that can affect a person’s health, finances or safety. Google says such content must be highly accurate and consistent with established expert consensus, and that trust matters most. For law and health sites, that means named authors, a licensed reviewer, primary sources and honest dates.
Google publishes principles and no workflow. This post covers three things:
- What Google documents.
- What it leaves open.
- The editorial rules we apply to our own pages and recommend for client content, with before and after examples.
Key takeaway YMYL pages need named authors, a licensed reviewer, primary sources and honest dates. Google documents the principles, and the workflow is ours.
What counts as YMYL for a law or health site?
Definition YMYL covers topics where a wrong answer could materially harm someone.
Google’s helpful content guidance was last updated 5 October 2026 and accessed 22 October 2026. It describes topics that affect the health, financial stability or safety of people, and calls them “Your Money or Your Life.”
Most pages on a personal injury, family law, dental or medical site sit in that territory. Readers may act on a page about deadlines, treatment risks or what to do after an accident. Our YMYL glossary entry has the one-line definition.
Is the risk the same across a site?
Exposure isn’t even across a site. In our view a staff bio carries little risk. A page explaining a legal deadline or a procedure carries a lot, so we scale review effort to the risk.
Is E-E-A-T a ranking factor?
One point gets distorted online, and the guidance is plain about it. Google says E-E-A-T “itself isn’t a specific ranking factor.”
Its systems look at a mix of signals that can indicate experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trust, and trust is the most important of them. Our E-E-A-T guide walks through the details.
What does Google actually document for YMYL pages?
Google documents principles, not a checklist. The same guidance asks who wrote the content, how it was produced and why it exists.
It also says YMYL content must be highly accurate and consistent with expert consensus. The table maps each documented point to the rule we use.
| What Google documents | Source | Our rule |
|---|---|---|
| Make it clear who wrote the content, with accurate bylines where readers expect them | Helpful content guidance | Every page carries a named author line; no invented people |
| Explain how content was produced, including automation, where readers would wonder | Helpful content guidance | AI use is disclosed and every claim is human-verified |
| YMYL content must be highly accurate and consistent with expert consensus; clear sourcing builds trust | Helpful content guidance | Every claim has a primary source and access date in a source log |
| Review generative AI output manually, including metadata | Generative AI guidance | Titles, descriptions and schema are fact-checked too |
| Show a visible date and keep markup dates consistent with it | Publication dates guidance | Separate published and substantively reviewed dates |
| Author markup uses the author’s name only, with a URL that identifies them | Article structured data guidance | One author page per person; markup matches the page |
Read the table by column. The first column is what Google says, and the second is where it says it. Only the third column, our rule, is ours.
Watch out What the documents omit matters as much. None of the pages we opened says reviewer credentials raise rankings, that a disclaimer helps, or that a set number of citations is needed. The right-hand column is our practice, not Google policy.
Who should review legal and health pages?
A licensed professional in the right field and jurisdiction should review any page readers may act on, and their review should be visible and dated. That is how a small site makes “consistent with expert consensus” true in practice, rather than only claiming it.
We are SEO editors with no legal or clinical credentials, so we don’t sign off on the substance of a law or health page. The client’s licensed professional does. Our job is to structure the page so that review is easy to give and easy to see.
Key takeaway For you, the point of the rules is simple. A reader should be able to see who reviewed the page, what they reviewed and when.
What reviewer rules do we use?
The reviewer rules we use:
- The reviewer is a named, licensed professional whose license is checkable with the relevant board or bar.
- Their jurisdiction is stated on legal pages. Law varies by state, and “check your local laws” is not a substitute for stating which law was checked.
- The page says what was reviewed and when, not just “medically reviewed.”
- If the reviewer changes a claim, the source log changes too.
- A reviewer who has not read the page does not appear on it.
Quick check Can you check the reviewer’s license with the relevant board or bar, and has the reviewer read the page? If either answer is no, the name does not go on the page.
Which professional advertising rules apply?
Professional advertising rules apply on top of search guidance.
- The American Bar Association’s Model Rule 7.2 covers lawyer advertising. It requires the name and contact information of at least one lawyer or firm responsible for the content. These are model rules, and each state adopts its own version.
- The American Dental Association’s Principles of Ethics say dentists must not advertise in a manner that is false or misleading in any material respect. They also set wording expectations for specialists.
Our post on attorney advertising rules and SEO is the companion read for lawyer content. Ask your own counsel or compliance contact before publishing.
How do you source and date a YMYL page?
Source every factual claim to the most authoritative document available, and record the date you checked it. Show readers two different dates: when the page was published and when someone last substantively reviewed it. A source log is the working file behind that.
- Published dateWhen the page first went live.
- Reviewed dateWhen a person last re-checked claims against sources or revised substance.
What goes in a source log?
Our source log has one row per claim. A row holds the sentence as written, the figure or wording, the period it covers, the source URL or citation, and the date accessed.
A claim with no row doesn’t ship. We trust sources in this order, from the top row down.
| Source type | How we use it |
|---|---|
| Statutes, regulations and court rules for legal pages; regulator and agency pages for health pages | The first stop for a fact |
| Professional bodies such as bar associations and dental or medical associations | Next in line |
| Clinical guidelines and peer-reviewed research | With the study named and dated |
| Reputable journalism | To point at primary documents, not as the source itself |
| Vendors and marketing sites | For what they claim, never for what is true |
How do you date a YMYL page?
Dates need the same discipline. Google’s guidance on publication dates asks for a visible date, clearly labeled as published or updated, with structured data that matches. It says dates should reflect the page’s own publication or update, not events the page describes.
It doesn’t say what counts as a real update. We change the updated date only when a person has re-checked claims against sources or revised substance. A typo fix doesn’t qualify.
A page showing today’s date over last year’s law is worse than one with an honest old date.
Quick check Does the updated date on this page match a real review? If nobody re-checked the claims, leave the date alone.
Each logged source also gets a recheck trigger, such as a statute amendment or a revised guideline. For the refresh side of this work, see our post on content refresh results.
What do editorial standards look like before and after?
Three examples follow. All are hypothetical, written to show the rule, and none comes from a client page or a measured result.
Legal page, before and after
Before:
Most car accident cases end in big settlements, so call us today to get the payout you deserve. Do not wait or you will lose your case.
After:
Time limits for filing an injury lawsuit are set by state law and differ by type of claim. The statute for this state is cited at the end of this page, with the date we last checked it.
Reviewed by a named attorney licensed in this state, on a stated date. This page is general information, not advice on your case.
The first version promises an outcome, invents urgency and cites nothing. The second states a rule, names its jurisdiction, points to the primary source and shows who checked it. It reads duller, and that’s fine.
Health page, before and after
Before:
Dental implants last a lifetime and the procedure is painless, so there is no reason to wait.
After:
How long an implant lasts depends on bone and gum health, oral hygiene and habits such as smoking. Your dentist assesses these at an exam.
The sources are listed below. Reviewed by a named dentist licensed in this state, on a stated date.
“Last a lifetime” and “painless” are absolute claims about an individual outcome. In our reading, they are the kind the ADA’s rule against advertising that is misleading in a material respect is aimed at.
Our post on dental implant SEO is a companion read on that topic.
Date line, before and after
| Version | Date line |
|---|---|
| Before | “Updated 2026” printed on a page whose text has not changed since 2023 |
| After | “Published 14 March 2023. Substantively revised 22 October 2026: statute section and deadline wording rechecked and updated. Reviewed by a named attorney.” |
The after version tells the reader what changed, which is the point of the label.
Key takeaway The three examples share one move. Each replaces a promise or a vague date with a condition, a source and a name.
How should AI drafts be handled on YMYL pages?
Treat every claim in an AI draft as unverified until a person has traced it to a primary source. Google’s generative AI content guidance was last updated 1 October 2026. It says models predict likely word sequences rather than retrieve facts, so output must be manually fact-checked and reviewed before publishing.
The same page says the review applies to metadata too: titles, meta descriptions, structured data and alt text. It adds that sharing how content was created gives readers context, which is a reason to state your process on the page.
What limits do we apply?
For AI-assisted drafts on these pages we apply four limits:
- AI may help with outline, research questions and plain-language editing. It does not supply facts.
- Any statistic, deadline, dosage-style detail or legal standard gets a source log row or gets cut.
- A named editor reads the final text against the source log. The reviewer reads it after.
- Scale is capped by review capacity. Google’s spam policies define scaled content abuse as many pages generated primarily to manipulate rankings. Our post on AI content at scale covers where that line sits.
Key takeaway In short, AI may help you start a page, but a person must finish it and check every claim.
Our post on AI Overviews and YMYL looks at the same topics from the AI search side. Either way, an accurate, named, sourced and dated page is the one worth quoting.
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Which markup and page elements support the standards?
Markup should mirror what the page shows and nothing more. Google’s article structured data guidance was last updated 8 September 2026.
It says the author name property should contain only the name, with no job title or honorific. It also says the author URL should point to a page that uniquely identifies the author.
It also says to use Person for people and Organization for organizations, and to give each author a separate entry. For internal profile pages, ProfilePage structured data can describe the person or organization the page is about. Google lists an author page on a news site as a valid use.
What on-page elements do we require?
For a law or health site, the on-page elements we require are:
- A visible author or editor line linking to a real author page.
- A reviewer line with the credential stated in text and the jurisdiction for legal pages.
- A visible published date and a separate reviewed date.
- A sources section with links to primary documents.
- Markup for author and dates that matches those visible elements exactly.
Key takeaway Think of markup as a mirror. It reflects the page, and it cannot add credentials the page does not have.
None of this creates expertise. It makes existing expertise legible. If a reviewer never read the page, perfect markup is a false statement.
What about guest posts, sponsored content and partner pages?
Label them clearly, and do not host content you have not reviewed. Google’s spam policies (last updated 28 August 2026) describe site reputation abuse as third-party content published mainly to exploit the host site’s ranking signals. One example is a medical site hosting a low-quality page about casinos.
Sponsored content is a separate issue. The Federal Trade Commission’s native advertising guide is from December 2015.
It says an ad is deceptive if it promotes goods or services but is not readily identifiable as an ad. Necessary disclosures must be clear and prominent.
Our view Any third-party or paid page should get the same review as your own, plus a plain label. If nobody can review it, don’t publish it.
Our post on law firm link building is a companion read on outside coverage.
What does the evidence not show?
It does not show that reviewer bylines, bios or disclaimers raise rankings, and it does not give a threshold for any of these signals. What it shows is Google’s stated expectation: accuracy, expert consensus, clear authorship and sourcing, with trust the most important element.
The limits of this post:
- Google’s guidance describes principles. We found no document that lists required elements for law or health pages.
- We cite only the YMYL definition in section 2.3 of Google’s Search Quality Rater Guidelines (11 September 2025). We make no claim about the rest of that document.
- We have no case study showing results from reviewer lines or dating rules, and we do not claim any.
- The before and after examples are hypothetical. They show editorial practice, not measured outcomes.
- Professional advertising rules vary by state and board. We cite model or national rules and not every jurisdiction.
The short version is that Google sets the bar, and the workflow in this post is ours.
Watch out All of this is SEO editorial practice, not legal or medical advice. Your counsel or compliance lead has the final word on what your profession permits.
What should a small legal or health team do first?
Start with the ten pages that carry the most risk and traffic. Review time is the bottleneck, so spend it where a wrong sentence costs the most.
A hypothetical shows why. Say a firm has 60 practice-area and FAQ pages and its attorney can spare two hours a week.
At 30 minutes a page, that is four pages a week, so all 60 take 15 weeks (60 divided by 4). Reviewing only the ten riskiest pages first takes 2.5 weeks.
Source: Hypothetical example
View the data as a table
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| All 60 pages | 15 weeks |
| The ten riskiest pages | 2.5 weeks |
Your numbers will differ. Do the sum anyway before promising a “fully reviewed site.” Ten pages is a size one reviewer can finish, so you can show a real result early.
- List pages that explain deadlines, procedures, risks, costs or eligibility. Those are your high-risk set.
- Build a source log row for every factual claim on each page. Cut claims you cannot source.
- Get a named, licensed reviewer to read the page against the source log, and record the date.
- Add the visible author, reviewer and date lines, then make the markup match.
- Fix absolute and outcome claims. Replace them with conditions and sources.
- Set a recheck date and a trigger for each source.
- Only then scale to the next tier of pages.
- List the high-risk pagesPages on deadlines, procedures, risks, costs or eligibility.
- Build a source logOne row for every factual claim. Cut what you cannot source.
- Get a licensed reviewerA named reviewer reads the page against the log and dates it.
- Add visible lines and markupAuthor, reviewer and dates, with markup that matches.
- Fix absolute claimsReplace outcome promises with conditions and sources.
- Set recheck datesGive each source a date and a trigger.
- Scale to the next tierOnly after the first tier is done.
Our content SEO service builds this workflow into briefs and reviews, and our guide to SEO content covers the wider process. For law firms, the legal industry hub and law firm blog ideas show where to point the effort. The dental hub does the same for practices.
Watch out This page is general information, not legal or medical advice. Rules differ by state and change over time, so check the current rules for your own situation.
Frequently asked questions
What does YMYL stand for?
YMYL stands for Your Money or Your Life. Google’s helpful content guidance uses the term for topics that could significantly affect the health, financial stability or safety of people. Law firm and medical or dental pages often fall inside it, because readers may act on what they read when making serious decisions.
Is E-E-A-T a ranking factor for legal and health sites?
Google’s guidance says E-E-A-T is not itself a specific ranking factor. It says its systems identify a mix of factors that can help determine which content shows experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trust.
It also says trust is the most important of these, so treat it as a quality standard, not a switch you can flip.
Do I need a doctor or lawyer to review every page?
Not every page, but a licensed professional in the relevant field and jurisdiction should check any page that gives information readers may act on. Google asks for content on these topics to be highly accurate and consistent with expert consensus. A reviewer is how a small team makes that claim true.
Does a disclaimer protect a health or legal page in search?
A disclaimer does not make inaccurate content accurate, and we found no Google documentation saying a disclaimer improves rankings. Keep one if your professional rules or counsel call for it. But spend the effort on correct, sourced, dated content that a named reviewer has checked.
Can I use AI to draft YMYL content?
Google says generative AI can help with research and structure. But generative models predict word sequences and can be wrong, so content must be manually fact-checked and reviewed before publishing. On law and health pages we treat every AI-assisted claim as unverified until a person has traced it to a primary source.
How often should legal and health pages be reviewed?
We found no Google schedule, so our working rule is a scheduled review every six to twelve months. We add an immediate review when a statute, regulation or clinical guideline the page cites changes. Only change the visible updated date when something substantive was checked or revised.
Draft your next page with our SEO content brief generator, then Get Your Organic Growth Plan.
Sources
- Creating helpful, reliable, people-first content, Google Search Central, last updated 5 Oct 2026, accessed 22 Oct 2026
- Google Search’s guidance on using generative AI content on your website, Google Search Central, last updated 1 Oct 2026, accessed 22 Oct 2026
- Publication dates guidance, Google Search Central, accessed 22 Oct 2026
- Article structured data, Google Search Central, last updated 8 Sep 2026, accessed 22 Oct 2026
- Profile page structured data, Google Search Central, last updated 8 Sep 2026, accessed 22 Oct 2026
- Spam policies for Google web search, Google Search Central, last updated 28 Aug 2026, accessed 22 Oct 2026
- Search Quality Rater Guidelines, section 2.3, Google (11 September 2025), accessed 23 October 2026
- Model Rule 7.2 Advertising, American Bar Association, accessed 22 Oct 2026
- Principles of Ethics and Code of Professional Conduct, Section 5 (Veracity), American Dental Association, accessed 22 Oct 2026
- Native Advertising: A Guide for Businesses, Federal Trade Commission, December 2015, accessed 22 Oct 2026
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