Google Update Reduces Blogs' Organic Visibility and Citations

SEO analyst Lily Ray reports an unconfirmed Google algorithm update in mid-January 2026 that sharply reduced organic visibility for dozens of brands, focusing analysis on 11 subfolders from January 20 to February 16, 2026. Using Ahrefs and Sistrix data, all 11 subfolders saw concurrent AI citation declines—average citation drop -22.5% versus -26.7% average organic traffic loss—while Perplexity remained notably resilient.