Why it matters
Google accepts JSON-LD, microdata and RDFa and interprets them identically, but recommends JSON-LD because one contiguous block is easier to author and people make fewer mistakes with it. Said at Search Central Live: microdata can save payload where page weight is critical.
How to meet it
Render JSON-LD on the server in a script type="application/ld+json" block generated from the same data as the visible page, one block per entity or a single @graph. Switch to microdata only for very weight-sensitive templates.
How to test it
The Rich Results Test on one URL per template detects the expected items without errors, and the JSON-LD is present in the raw HTML (curl).
How Regensbot covers it
Decided from one URL.
An audit reads the response, the headers, the HTML, robots.txt, the sitemaps and the structured data, and the finding shows the evidence it saw.
Sources
Google documents01
Claims in the knowledge base04
- D2-C495ConfirmedWhat is Structured Data and why we need it on the internet.Said on stage
- D2-C494ConsistentWhat is Structured Data and why we need it on the internet.Said on stage
- D2-C496UndocumentedWhat is Structured Data and why we need it on the internet.Said on stage
- D2-C497n/aWhat is Structured Data and why we need it on the internet.The author's interpretation
Claim IDs refer to the Search Central Live 2026 knowledge base. The knowledge base (opens in a new tab)
- Confirmed
- Google's documentation states the same thing.
- Consistent
- Google's documentation supports it without stating it.
- Undocumented
- Said or shown at the event, not in the documentation.
- n/a
- Nothing to verify: a quotation, framing, opinion or analysis.