Google Removes Video Thumbnails In Search Results When Video Is Not Main Content

Google announced it will remove the video thumbnail image from the search results snippet when that video is not the main content of the page. Google said this change will impact search appearance reported metrics for videos in the performance report in Google Search Console.

Here is the change:

Google said the “video thumbnails only appear next to Google search results when the video is the main content of a page.” “This will make it easier for users to understand what to expect when they visit a page,” Google added.

Google posted in the Search Console data anomalies page, “Google now only shows video thumbnails next to Google search results when the video is the main content of the page. You may see a change in search appearance reported metrics for videos in the performance report, video indexing report, and video enhancement report. Read more about the change in the blog post.”

Do you see the change yet? Glenn Gabe did not as of yesterday:

FYI, the change doesn’t seem to have rolled out yet. I’m still seeing the second format in the SERPs (when the video thumbnail appears to the right of the listing). That’s when the video is not the main content of the page. I’ll check more later. 🙂 https://t.co/Q6Guvo8UQo pic.twitter.com/NG2kK1Yy2e

— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) April 13, 2023

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