FAQ rich results not showing: the feature was retired, and what your FAQ markup is for now

Rule out a real problem first

It takes two minutes to confirm the markup itself is sound, which matters if other systems read it.

1. View source and find the FAQPage block. Paste it into our JSON-LD validator. It should parse, with each Question carrying a name and an acceptedAnswer with text.
2. Check that every marked-up question and answer is visible on the page, word for word.
3. Confirm the page is indexed: inspect the URL in Search Console.

If all three pass, the absence of dropdowns is the retirement, not a fault. If the JSON fails to parse, it will be listed under unparsable structured data and is worth correcting for tidiness.

Do not expect Search Console to help here. Google removes rich result reports and Rich Results Test support for features it retires, so a missing FAQ report is part of the same change.

A short history, so old advice makes sense

• FAQ rich results once showed for almost any page with valid markup, which led to FAQ blocks being added to pages purely to take up more room in results.
• In 2023 Google limited the display to authoritative government and health sites. HowTo rich results were withdrawn the same year.
• On 7 May 2026 the FAQ display was retired for everyone, and Google subsequently removed the FAQPage guide from its Search Central documentation.

Articles and plugin screens written before these dates still promise dropdowns. Treat any tutorial that says FAQ schema "gets you more SERP space" as out of date.

Should you remove the markup?

No need. Unused structured data does not harm a page, and FAQPage remains a valid schema.org type. Our view:

• Keep it where the FAQ is real. A genuine set of questions with visible answers is clearly described by the markup. Other consumers of structured data can still read it, and question-and-answer formatting is easy for any machine to extract. We cover that reasoning in the FAQ and HowTo schema documentation.
• Remove FAQ sections that existed only for the rich result. Five thin questions appended to every product page, repeating the same shipping answer, add length without adding value. Now that there is no display reward, they are only filler.
• Do not add new FAQ markup expecting a visual change. Add an FAQ if readers need one.

If you maintain FAQ blocks by hand, the FAQ schema generator writes escaped JSON-LD from your questions and answers.

Reading the traffic change

A result with two expanded questions under it was taller than its neighbours, and some of those questions were answered right in the results. Losing that changes click-through in ways that are easy to misread.

In Search Console's Performance report, compare the weeks before and after 7 May 2026 for pages that had FAQ results:

• Position unchanged, CTR changed: that is the display change. Rankings were not affected.
• Position dropped as well: look for another cause, such as a core update in the same period or changes on the page.

Filtering by Search appearance is not a dependable way to isolate this, since appearance filters for retired features stop collecting data.

What still changes how a result looks

Effort is better spent on features Google still supports for ordinary sites:

• Title and snippet. The largest lever on every result. See Google rewrites the title tag and Google ignores the meta description.
• Breadcrumbs, which replace the raw URL with a readable trail.
• Product, review, recipe, event and video markup on pages that are really about those things.
• A favicon and a correct site name.
• Images: a large, relevant image with max-image-preview:large allowed helps eligibility for larger thumbnails and Discover.

Our reference pages list the current rich result status of each type, including FAQPage and HowTo.

Content that answers questions still works

The format was retired; the behaviour it served was not. People ask questions, and Google and AI assistants assemble answers from pages that state them clearly. A question as a heading followed by a direct two-or-three-sentence answer is still a strong structure for featured snippets, "People also ask" boxes and AI-generated answers. Hydrogen SEO's approach to this is described under answer engine optimization. Write the FAQ for the reader and leave the markup as a description of it.