Structured Data

Standardised code (usually JSON-LD) added to web pages that explicitly describes the content to search engines.

Structured data uses Schema.org vocabulary to annotate page content so that search engines can understand it precisely, rather than inferring it from natural language. For example, a recipe page can explicitly declare cook time, ingredients, and calorie count — data that would be buried in prose without structured markup.

Google uses structured data to power rich results (enhanced SERP appearances), Knowledge Panel entries, and as signals for AI Overviews and generative search answers. Rich results for types like Recipe, HowTo, Product, and FAQPage can dramatically increase click-through rates — recipe rich results, for example, typically show star ratings, cook time, and an image directly in search.

JSON-LD (JavaScript Object Notation for Linked Data) is Google's recommended format and can be injected into the page via a <script type="application/ld+json"> tag anywhere in the HTML — it does not need to be inline with the content. This makes it easy to add without modifying the visible HTML. The alternative formats Microdata and RDFa are both valid but harder to maintain.