Every Google Business Profile checklist tells you to post weekly. Almost none of them tell you what posting achieves, because the honest answer is awkward.
I went looking for the actual testing. Here is what it found.
What Google Says: Nothing
Start here, because it is more informative than it looks. Google's help page on Posts says they help customers decide to visit your business. It makes no ranking claim. And Google's local ranking page lists exactly three factors, relevance, distance and prominence, with no mention of Posts anywhere.
Google has never said Posts help rankings. It has also never said they do not. That silence is the starting point for everything below.
The Two Tests
Test one. An agency took three dormant listings, two marketing companies and a physical therapist, all in small towns where a ranking change would be easy to spot. They posted once a week for nine weeks and tracked 441 keywords per location in the local pack.
Their conclusion: adding Google Posts had no measurable impact on rankings in the local pack. Of the three, one showed no change, one declined for reasons unrelated to posting, and one fluctuated because of changes in how job results displayed.
Test two. A different practitioner went at it from the opposite direction, investigating merchant claims that posting had hurt their rankings. Four cases: two who reported drops and two posting heavily as controls. His finding was inconsistency. A suspected bug explained the drop for two companies but not why the others were unaffected. His conclusion was that Posts likely do not directly affect rankings, and that businesses should test individually rather than accept blanket claims.
Both tests are small. Three listings and four cases respectively, and both date from 2021, though the first agency still stands behind theirs as of early 2026. That is thin evidence. But it is the only evidence, and it points the same direction from two different angles, one of which was actively looking for the opposite effect. Nobody has published anything contradicting it.
The Placement Problem
Here is the practical reason Posts underdeliver, and it has nothing to do with algorithms.
On desktop, your posts appear in the From the owner section near the bottom of the knowledge panel. Most people never scroll that far. On mobile they fare better, appearing in the Updates or Overview tabs. And Offer posts reportedly do not show on desktop at all.
You are writing content for a slot most of your audience will not reach. That is worth knowing before you commit to a weekly schedule.
What Posts Are Genuinely Good For
I am not telling you to stop. I am telling you to use them for what they do rather than for a ranking benefit that does not appear to exist.
- Time-bound Offers and Events. These respect their date ranges, which means they cannot go stale and embarrass you. An Offer can run up to twelve months and repeat daily, weekly or monthly. An Event post allows up to 1,500 characters.
- Restaurants and bars specifically. Google's What's happening module pulls from Posts and linked social accounts and surfaces specials, live music and events near the top of the profile. It launched for single-location restaurants in May 2025 and expanded to multi-location restaurants and bars in several countries including the US in October 2025. If you are in that category, Posts finally have a prominent home.
- Answering the question people are about to ask. Holiday hours, a temporary closure, a new service, parking changes. The person looking at your profile right now is deciding whether to come.
- Looking alive. No ranking claim here, just a human one. A profile whose last post was in 2023 reads as a business that might not exist anymore.
On what performs: per one agency's findings, images that include text performed better, and non-stock images reportedly get substantially more clicks than stock. That is about engagement, not ranking, and I would treat the specific multiplier as directional.
The Actual News: You Can Measure It Again
This is why the question is worth revisiting in 2026 rather than just repeating 2021's answer.
Google launched post view metrics in 2018, removed them in January 2023, and has been restoring them through 2026 under the label people viewed. Reports put limited testing from August 2026 and an official rollout announced in September 2026, covering all post types across Search and Maps on an 18-month rolling window.
Which changes the recommendation completely. For three years, posting was an act of faith. Now you can post for two months, look at the numbers, and decide for your own business rather than mine. That is a better answer than anything I could tell you. The rest of the Performance tab is here.
One note of caution: this is reported from a single source and I have not independently confirmed the rollout reached everyone. Check your own profile.
One New Rule
As of September 2026 Google updated the Posts guidelines around contact information. It may remove posts containing unverified contact details including phone numbers, email addresses and social media handles, and posts with phone numbers might be rejected if the number cannot be verified as belonging to that business. This actually loosens the previous blanket ban on phone numbers while adding a verification condition. The practical read: a number matching your profile is fine, a call tracking number may not be.
The Verdict
- Posts do not appear to move local pack rankings. Two independent tests, one specifically hunting for harm, found no effect.
- Google has never claimed otherwise, and Posts appear in none of its stated ranking factors.
- They are a conversion and communication surface, and on desktop a badly placed one.
- The conversion case is not backed by controlled data either. Be honest about that.
- They are now measurable, so test on your own profile for two months.
If weekly posting is crowding out work that does move the needle, your priorities are wrong. The monthly maintenance that does matter is here, and reviews beat posts by a wide margin for a local business with limited time.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do Google Posts help with rankings?
The available evidence says no. One agency tested three dormant listings, posted weekly for nine weeks and tracked 441 keywords per location, and found no measurable impact on local pack rankings. A separate investigation looking at whether posting might actually hurt found inconsistent results and concluded Posts likely do not directly affect rankings either way. Google itself has never claimed a ranking benefit and Posts appear nowhere in its stated ranking factors.
Are Google Posts still a thing in 2026?
Yes. Three types remain live: Updates, Offers and Events. Google has flip-flopped on the name, renaming Add update back to Posts in June 2025, which was a label change rather than a functional one.
How long do Google Posts last?
Google archives posts older than six months unless a date range is set. Offers and Events only display within their specified dates and then drop out of the carousel while remaining under View all. Offer posts support date ranges up to twelve months and can repeat, and Event posts allow up to 1,500 characters of description.
Where do Google Posts actually appear?
On mobile Search and Maps they appear in the Updates or Overview tabs. On desktop they sit in the From the owner section, which is near the bottom of the knowledge panel. That placement, rather than the algorithm, is the main reason Posts underperform expectations. Offer posts reportedly do not currently appear on desktop at all.
So should I bother posting?
For time-bound Offers and Events, yes, because they respect date ranges and do not go stale. For restaurants and bars, yes, because Posts feed the What's happening module, which is one of the few places Google surfaces post content prominently. For generic weekly updates purely for SEO, the evidence does not support it. And as of September 2026 you can finally measure it on your own profile rather than taking anyone's word for it.
Can I put my phone number in a Google Post?
As of September 2026 Google's guidance changed. It may remove posts containing unverified contact information including phone numbers, email addresses and social media handles, and posts with phone numbers might be rejected if the number cannot be verified as connected to that business. So a number matching your profile is likely fine and an unrelated tracking number is not.
If you want an outside read on which bits of your GBP routine are worth the time, send me the profile. I will tell you what I would drop. Findings here reflect the published testing as of October 2026, and if someone publishes a larger study tomorrow I will happily update this.