Article Schema: How to Mark Up Blog and News Content

What is Article Schema?

Article Schema is structured data using the Schema.org Article type or a more specific subtype such as BlogPosting or NewsArticle.

The object can describe:

• the article headline;
• its canonical page;
• the author or authors;
• the publishing organisation;
• the original publication date;
• the date of a meaningful update;
• representative images;
• a description and editorial section; and
• whether content is behind a paywall.

A reader can see a byline, date and hero image in the page layout. Article structured data connects those elements explicitly so machines can distinguish the author from the publisher, the update date from an event mentioned in the story and the article image from the site logo.

The markup should describe the real article. It does not replace the visible headline, byline, date or content.

What does Article structured data help with?

It identifies the page as editorial content

Article Schema can tell a machine that the page is a blog post, news report or other article rather than a category, product, author profile or generic webpage.

It clarifies authorship and publishing relationships

The object can connect the article to each author and to the organisation that published it. Author profile URLs and stable organisation identifiers can reduce ambiguity between people or publishers with similar names.

It supplies date and image information

Google says Article markup can help it understand and show better title text, images and date information in Search and other properties.

It supports consistent publishing templates

A CMS can generate the same core fields for every article. A crawler can then find missing authors, invalid dates, broken images and content types using the wrong Schema subtype.

It may support richer search presentation

Valid markup can make a page eligible for supported article experiences. Eligibility does not guarantee that Google will show a particular image, date or result treatment.

Article markup is not required for inclusion in Google News features such as Top stories. It provides explicit information rather than acting as an admission ticket.

Article, BlogPosting or NewsArticle?

Choose the most specific type that accurately reflects the content.

Article

Article is the broad parent type. Use it for editorial content that does not fit a more specific supported subtype or when the publishing distinction is not useful.

BlogPosting

BlogPosting is suitable for an individual post within a blog, Academy or editorial resource centre.

• a company insight article;
• a tutorial;
• a thought-leadership post;
• an Academy lesson; or
• a product-update explanation with lasting editorial value.

NewsArticle

NewsArticle is intended for factual reporting about current events or news. It is commonly used by news publishers and newsroom sections.

Do not label an ordinary evergreen marketing guide as NewsArticle merely because the type appears more prominent. The subtype should agree with the article's actual role.

Other related types

Schema.org contains more specific article subtypes, including TechArticle, ScholarlyArticle and Report. These may communicate useful semantics to systems that understand them, but Google documents Article, BlogPosting and NewsArticle for its Article search feature.

If a more specific Schema.org subtype is used, check how the intended search engine or consumer processes it. Do not assume general vocabulary validity creates a particular search presentation.

Which pages should use Article Schema?

Good candidates include:

• individual blog posts;
• news stories;
• analysis and opinion articles;
• tutorials and Academy guides;
• sports reports;
• editorial product reviews;
• long-form interviews; and
• subscription articles intended for indexing.

Avoid applying Article markup to:

• blog category and tag archives;
• author profile pages;
• search results;
• product or service landing pages without a genuine article;
• the homepage merely because it lists recent stories; or
• thin announcement pages with no meaningful editorial content.

The article should be the main content of the marked-up URL. The page should return a successful response, be crawlable and point canonically to the version intended for indexing.

Which Article properties should you include?

Google's current Article guidance focuses on relevant recommended properties rather than one universal field list for every publisher. Include as many useful properties as the page genuinely supports.

headline

Use the real article title. Keep it concise and aligned with the visible H1.

"headline": "Article Schema: How to Mark Up Blog and News Content"

Do not insert a different search-focused headline that visitors cannot see.

mainEntityOfPage

Use the canonical article page as the main entity location:

"mainEntityOfPage": {
  "@type": "WebPage",
  "@id": "https://example.com/academy/article-schema/"
}

author and publisher

Use a Person for an individual writer or Organization when the organisation genuinely authored the piece. Use an Organization object or reference to identify the publisher.

datePublished and dateModified

Use the first public date for datePublished and the date of the most recent meaningful editorial change for dateModified.

image

Provide one or more high-quality, crawlable images that represent the article. Avoid using the publisher's logo as the article image.

description, articleSection and keywords

Supply a concise, accurate description and use articleSection or keywords only where the publishing system maintains them accurately. Do not turn keywords into a hidden list of every phrase the page hopes to rank for.

An Article Schema JSON-LD example

This example describes a fictional Academy guide as a BlogPosting:

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "BlogPosting",
  "@id": "https://example.com/academy/article-schema/#article",
  "mainEntityOfPage": {
    "@type": "WebPage",
    "@id": "https://example.com/academy/article-schema/"
  },
  "headline": "Article Schema: How to Mark Up Blog and News Content",
  "description": "A practical guide to Article structured data for authors, dates and images.",
  "image": [
    "https://example.com/images/article-schema-1x1.jpg",
    "https://example.com/images/article-schema-4x3.jpg",
    "https://example.com/images/article-schema-16x9.jpg"
  ],
  "datePublished": "2026-09-23T09:00:00+01:00",
  "dateModified": "2026-09-23T09:00:00+01:00",
  "author": {
    "@type": "Person",
    "name": "Alex Morgan",
    "url": "https://example.com/authors/alex-morgan/"
  },
  "publisher": {
    "@type": "Organization",
    "@id": "https://example.com/#organization",
    "name": "Example Analytics",
    "url": "https://example.com/"
  },
  "articleSection": "Schema"
}
</script>

Replace every example value with real publishing data. The title, dates, author, image and section need to agree with the visible article.

The @id ending #article identifies the article object, while mainEntityOfPage.@id identifies the canonical webpage. The publisher's @id can reference the stable Organization object defined elsewhere on the site.

How to mark up authors

Authorship is a major source of avoidable Article Schema errors.

Include every visible author

If the article credits two writers, include two separate author objects:

"author": [
  {
    "@type": "Person",
    "name": "Alex Morgan",
    "url": "https://example.com/authors/alex-morgan/"
  },
  {
    "@type": "Person",
    "name": "Sam Taylor",
    "url": "https://example.com/authors/sam-taylor/"
  }
]

Do not combine both names into one string. Use Person for a person and Organization for an organisation. Put a job title in jobTitle, not in the name.

Link to an identifying profile

Use url for an internal author page where possible. A useful author page can include a biography, expertise, photograph and links to other work. Google can also use sameAs to help disambiguate an author, but link only to a page that clearly represents that person.

Keep visible and structured bylines aligned

Do not add an expert to the markup if the page does not credit them. If a reviewer or editor has a distinct role, represent that role visibly and with an appropriate property rather than silently replacing the author. Article markup needs to match the visible page; review the underlying Schema.org concepts and make the content accessible with descriptive image alternatives.

How to mark up the publisher

The publisher is the organisation responsible for publishing the article. It is not automatically the same as the author.

"publisher": {
  "@type": "Organization",
  "@id": "https://example.com/#organization",
  "name": "Example Analytics",
  "url": "https://example.com/"
}

If the full Organization object already defines the logo and official details, the article can reference its stable @id. Avoid generating slightly different publisher names and logos on different article templates.

For a network with several publications, distinguish the publication brand, legal owner and website deliberately. The name shown to readers should help determine which entity acts as publisher.

How to use publication and modification dates

Preserve the original publication date

datePublished should represent when the article first became public. Do not overwrite it when the article is later corrected or refreshed.

Change the modification date for meaningful updates

Use dateModified when the content receives a substantive editorial update, such as adding new guidance, correcting important facts, replacing obsolete instructions or expanding the analysis materially.

A cookie-banner change, ad refresh or automated build should not make every article look newly updated.

Use ISO 8601 and a timezone

"datePublished": "2026-09-23T09:00:00+01:00"

Without a timezone, Google may use the timezone associated with its crawler, which may not match the publisher's intended moment. The visible byline date should agree with the structured data; markup is one signal rather than a command.

How to choose article images

Article images should represent the article itself. Google recommends crawlable and indexable image URLs, a supported file format, relevant content, high-resolution assets and multiple useful aspect ratios including 16:9, 4:3 and 1:1. Aim for at least 50,000 pixels when width and height are multiplied.

Do not use:

• the site logo as the article hero image;
• a generic placeholder repeated across the whole blog;
• a blocked CDN URL;
• an image that belongs to another article; or
• a temporary signed URL that will expire.

Test the actual image response after a CDN or media-library migration. The JSON-LD can remain valid while the referenced file returns an error.

How to handle canonical and multi-part articles

Align with the canonical URL

The Article object, mainEntityOfPage, internal links and canonical element should agree about the preferred article URL. Avoid publishing the same full object with different canonical identities across tracking, print, AMP or syndicated URL variants.

Handle multi-part articles carefully

Google's Article guidance says a multi-part article should canonicalise each individual page or use a genuine view-all page. It should not automatically canonicalise every part to page one. Each indexable part needs a truthful relationship with its content.

Treat syndication and translations deliberately

If the same article appears on several domains, agree the attribution, licensing and canonical strategy with the publisher. Each translated article should use its own URL, language signals, dates where appropriate and accurate visible authorship.

How to mark up paywalled articles

Google provides specific structured-data guidance for subscription and paywalled content that publishers want crawled and indexed. A simplified pattern is:

"isAccessibleForFree": false,
"hasPart": {
  "@type": "WebPageElement",
  "isAccessibleForFree": false,
  "cssSelector": ".paywall"
}

The markup helps Google distinguish a legitimate paywall from cloaking. It does not grant search engines access automatically.

Keep bot-access policies consistent and follow current paywall, Flexible Sampling and Search preview guidance. If the content is not intended for indexing, a different access or indexing strategy may be more appropriate.

Article Schema for LLMs and AI visibility

AI-powered search systems often need to decide who wrote a page, which organisation published it, when it was updated and which image or URL represents the source.

Article > Author profile
Article > Publisher organisation
Article > Canonical webpage
Article > Publication date
Article > Modification date
Article > Representative image

For clearer attribution and entity relationships:

• credit every visible author separately;
• link authors to useful, stable profile pages;
• distinguish authors from the publisher;
• reference one consistent publisher organisation;
• preserve the original publication date;
• update dateModified only after meaningful changes;
• align the object with the canonical article URL; and
• make the visible page support every important structured claim.

This machine-readable clarity can support systems that choose to process it, but use varies across search engines and LLMs. Article Schema does not guarantee an AI citation, a link in a generated answer or correct attribution. The content itself remains central.

How to test Article Schema

Test the code during development

Use the Rich Results Test for Google's Article feature and the Schema Markup Validator for the wider object graph.

Test the live URL

After publication, test the canonical page. Confirm that the rendered output contains the final headline, authors, dates, images and publisher.

Check the visible page

• headline matches the visible article heading;
• authors match the byline and author URLs resolve to real profiles;
• dates match visible published and updated labels;
• image URLs point to the actual article imagery;
• mainEntityOfPage matches the canonical URL; and
• publisher matches the site's Organization object.

Test template variations

Include one author and several authors, personal and organisational bylines, new and substantially updated articles, different image sets, paywalled and free articles, multi-part or translated content and legacy posts created before the current CMS template.

Use URL Inspection and relevant Search Console reporting where available. Allow time for Google to recrawl a corrected article or template.

How to audit Article Schema across a website

Define the article population

Identify canonical URLs for blog posts, news reports, Academy lessons and other editorial content. Separate them from author pages, archives, categories and marketing landing pages.

Compare expected and detected types

Find article pages with no Article subtype, Article markup on non-article templates, blog posts marked inconsistently as Article and NewsArticle, duplicated objects from a theme and plugin, and old posts using an obsolete publisher or logo.

Audit authorship and dates

Group author names and URLs. Look for missing authors, combined names, inconsistent spelling, broken profile URLs, staff members incorrectly typed as organisations and publisher names inserted into author.name. Find missing, invalid or future publication dates, and check whether every page receives a fresh dateModified after each deployment.

Audit images and technical eligibility

Check image response codes, indexability, file types and repeated placeholders. Review response codes, robots directives, canonical targets and crawl depth. Find structured objects on redirected, noindexed or non-canonical URLs.

Segment by publishing template

News, Academy, blog and legacy templates may generate different output. Group issues by source so the right template or dataset can be repaired.

Audit Article Schema with Clearcrawl

Clearcrawl helps expose the content templates behind Article Schema errors. One malformed author field may affect years of archive content, while one current article tested manually can look perfect.

Use the crawl to find the complete pattern. Use individual validation and editorial review to confirm that the markup is technically valid and factually aligned with the page.

How to fix and verify Article Schema

1. 01
   Define each content template

   Decide which pages are articles and which subtype each template should generate. Exclude archives, profiles and generic landing pages.

2. 02
   Map the publishing fields

   Connect the headline, authors, publisher, dates, images, description and canonical URL to reliable CMS sources.

3. 03
   Repair author and publisher identities

   Create stable profile URLs, separate multiple authors and reference one consistent publisher organisation.

4. 04
   Correct dates and images

   Preserve original publication dates, update modification dates deliberately and replace broken or unsuitable article images.

5. 05
   Update the shared template

   Handle optional fields and arrays safely. Do not publish empty authors, invalid dates or placeholder images when a record is incomplete.

6. 06
   Validate representative cases

   Test new, old, updated, multi-author, paywalled and translated examples where applicable.

7. 07
   Publish and inspect the live output

   Confirm that the rendered article contains the expected object and that another plugin has not added a conflicting version.

8. 08
   Recrawl and monitor

   Compare coverage and issue counts with the baseline. Use Search Console and URL Inspection after Google has had time to process the changes.

Common mistakes

Frequently asked questions