May 2026 Google Core Update: Reddit now holds nearly 5x more TOP 3 positions than YouTube
Google finished rolling out the May 2026 core update on June 2, and the early read across the SEO community was that it hit harder than March. Our data tells a more interesting story.
We ran our traditional analysis, comparing the organic results position before and after the rollout. On raw volatility, May was actually calmer than March updates but more shifting than December. What moved was the makeup of the results page: Reddit gained more TOP 3 positions in all 20 niches at once, while YouTube thinned out of the regular links. The clearest signal in this update is which kind of sources Google now chooses to show more.
One quick note on wording. When we say “March,” we mean the March 2026 Spam Update and the March 2026 Core Update together. They rolled out days apart, and the data can’t tell which one caused what.
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Reddit’s share of the TOP 3 positions rose to 10.24% after May (8.56% after March, 9.19% after December), and the gain showed up in all 20 niches. It also won the #1 spot far more often. The number of keywords where Reddit ranks first rose 54% compared with the March update.
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YouTube moved in the opposite direction. Its share of the TOP 3 positions fell to 2.14% after May (2.50% after March).
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76.03% of TOP 3 URLs and 88.39% of TOP 10 URLs changed position, placing May between March and December at almost every tier. The update reordered the page more than it rebuilt it.
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Roughly 1 in 5 TOP 10 pages dropped out. 19.87% of pages that ranked in the TOP 10 before the update vanished from the TOP 100, and only 32.20% of the domains hit in March recovered.
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The TOP 3 is more varied than before. The number of unique domains in the TOP 3 rose 5.6% over March. Full TOP 3 monopolies, where one domain holds all three top spots for a keyword, fell to 1.99% of keywords from 3.24% after March.
Volatility put May in the middle compared to March and December
We count any change in a URL’s position for a given keyword as instability, from a single-place slip to a full exit from the results, and we measure each URL against where it sat before the rollout.
According to our analysis, the May update was busier than the one in December and a touch calmer than the double update in March. And the gap held almost at every tier we looked at.
After the May 2026 update:
- 76.03% of the TOP 3 URLs changed positions
- 88.39% of the TOP 10 URLs changed positions
- 97.99% of the TOP 100 URLs changed positions
Across niches, the update was broad but even. The TOP 10 movement spanned just 7.3 percentage points, from Fashion and Beauty at 90.75% down to Real Estate at 83.50%, with Healthcare close behind at 85.80%. The two steadiest niches (Real Estate and Healthcare) are both ones where trust and authority carry the most weight, which aligns with where Reddit failed to gain later in the data.
Reddit gained more TOP 3 positions across all 20 niches
That is where this update gets interesting, and it starts with Reddit.
Reddit’s share of the TOP 3 positions rose to 10.24% after May, up from 8.56% after March and 9.19% after December. This means that more than one in ten now belongs to Reddit.
How to read the share figures: Our set covers about 100K keywords, and each keyword has three TOP 3 slots, for roughly 294,000 positions in total. So when we say Reddit holds 10.24% of the TOP 3 positions, we mean 10.24% of those ~294,000 slots.
Reddit landed at #1 more often, too. The number of keywords where Reddit holds the top result rose from 8,993 after March to 13,872 after May, a 54% jump. For context, the figure was 10,537 after December, so Reddit dipped through March and then climbed well past its December level in May. Wider presence is one thing; taking the top spot outright is the stronger signal, and Reddit did more of both.
This gain is also wide. Reddit grew in all 20 niches. But the size of the gain varied a lot, and it split along a clear line.
March Update
14.87%
May Update
18.05%
+ %
3.18%
March Update
10.46%
May Update
13.49%
+ %
3.03%
March Update
9.75%
May Update
12.77%
+ %
3.02%
March Update
11.50%
May Update
14.11%
+ %
2.61%
March Update
13.61%
May Update
15.88%
+ %
2.27%
March Update
4.77%
May Update
7.03%
+ %
2.26%
March Update
5.86%
May Update
7.70%
+ %
1.84%
March Update
10.42%
May Update
12.17%
+ %
1.75%
March Update
7.23%
May Update
8.91%
+ %
1.68%
March Update
7.29%
May Update
8.92%
+ %
1.63%
March Update
7.56%
May Update
9.18%
+ %
1.62%
March Update
5.84%
May Update
7.36%
+ %
1.52%
March Update
19.83%
May Update
21.33%
+ %
1.50%
March Update
5.93%
May Update
7.32%
+ %
1.39%
March Update
15.75%
May Update
16.93%
+ %
1.18%
March Update
9.11%
May Update
10.28%
+ %
1.17%
March Update
3.50%
May Update
4.59%
+ %
1.09%
March Update
2.75%
May Update
3.53%
+ %
0.78%
March Update
0.93%
May Update
1.33%
+ %
0.40%
March Update
3.67%
May Update
3.73%
+ %
0.06%
14.87%
18.05%
3.18%
10.46%
13.49%
3.03%
9.75%
12.77%
3.02%
11.50%
14.11%
2.61%
13.61%
15.88%
2.27%
4.77%
7.03%
2.26%
5.86%
7.70%
1.84%
10.42%
12.17%
1.75%
7.23%
8.91%
1.68%
7.29%
8.92%
1.63%
7.56%
9.18%
1.62%
5.84%
7.36%
1.52%
19.83%
21.33%
1.50%
5.93%
7.32%
1.39%
15.75%
16.93%
1.18%
9.11%
10.28%
1.17%
3.50%
4.59%
1.09%
2.75%
3.53%
0.78%
0.93%
1.33%
0.40%
3.67%
3.73%
0.06%
The biggest gains, in Pets, Education, Sports, and E-Commerce, are niches where people want real opinions and firsthand advice. The smallest gains, in Real Estate, Healthcare, and News, are YMYL niches where a wrong answer costs the most. Reddit barely moved in those three.
That split looks like a choice: where a search rewards personal experience, Google gave Reddit more room; where accuracy matters most, it held back.
One honest note on the number. This is Reddit’s share of the regular TOP 3 only. Count its spots in SERP features like Discussions and Forums, and its real presence is bigger than 10.24%.
YouTube showed up less in regular results as videos move elsewhere
While Reddit expanded, YouTube went the other way.
YouTube’s overall presence in the regular TOP 3 slipped as well. Its share of all TOP 3 positions fell to 2.14% after the May update, down from 2.50% after March and 2.40% after December.
The likely reason is that Google is moving YouTube out of the regular links and into video SERP features instead.
Full TOP 3 monopolies keep getting rarer
While looking at how domains spread across the TOP 3, we tracked a specific pattern we call a TOP 3 monopoly: one domain holding all three TOP 3 spots for the same keyword. These keep getting less common with every update. They affected 3.48% of all keywords after December, 3.24% after March, and 1.99% after May.
This is where YouTube shows up again. It has long been the site most likely to hold all three TOP 3 spots for a keyword, but its position in this regard is getting weaker as well. It was behind 19.2% of all monopolized keywords after December, dropping to 15.5% after March, and then to 15.4% after May.
In absolute terms, that is a small slice of search overall, falling from 0.67% of all keywords we analyzed to 0.31%. But among the keywords that do get monopolized, YouTube is still the name that shows up most.
For anyone competing on a busy keyword, the trend is encouraging. The odds of a single rival owning the whole result are falling. It is one of the few clearly good signals in this update.
The TOP 3 hold more unique domains than before
Fewer monopolies have a flip side. If no single domain is locking up a keyword, more sites get a place at the top. May spread the results across more sites.
Unique domains in the TOP 10 rose 2.05%, from 130,514 after March to 133,192 after May. In the TOP 3, the jump was bigger at 5.6%, from 47,525 domains after March to 50,204 after May.
May 2026 Core Update
50,204
March 2026 Spam & Core Updates
47,525
% difference
5.64
May 2026 Core Update
133,192
March 2026 Spam & Core Updates
130,514
% difference
2.05
50,204
47,525
5.64
133,192
130,514
2.05
More distinct domains in the same number of slots means the results are spread across a wider field of sites than in the earlier update. For anyone competing in a busy niche, the top of the page is a little less locked up than it was.
One in five TOP 10 pages dropped out of search
A more crowded and less concentrated TOP comes from churn: pages falling out, new ones climbing in, domains changing hands. The rest of this analysis looks at how that turnover played out, starting with what left.
The most uncomfortable number for site owners is how many TOP 10 pages disappear completely. After May, 19.87% of pages that had ranked in the TOP 10 before the update were gone from the TOP 100 afterward. That is close to 1 in 5.
For context, that figure was 14.70% after December and 24.10% after March. So May was harder than December but noticeably gentler than the March double update.
Most new TOP 3 pages were already close by
For every page that dropped out, another climbed in to take a TOP 3 spot. The question is where those new top results came from.
After May, 15.20% of the TOP 3 URLs had been outside the TOP 20 for that keyword before the update. December’s figure was 13.00%. March’s was 29.70%.
So, March pulled a bigger batch of new pages up from far down the results, while May mostly moved pages that were already close to the top.
These numbers tell you where to spend recovery effort. Most of May’s new TOP 3 entrants were already ranking nearby rather than climbing from deep down, so the pages with the best odds of moving up are the ones already close to the top.
A third of the domains that dropped after March returned to the TOP 10, and new ones kept arriving
We also looked at this update domain-by-domain to see how the websites hit in March did. The recovery was real but only partial. 32.20% of the domains that lost their TOP 10 spots after March climbed back into the TOP 10 after May. The other 67.80% are still missing.
Movement went both ways. 25.70% of the domains that held TOP 10 spots after March were gone after May. And 17.00% of the current TOP 10 had never appeared in any of our snapshots before, not in December, not in March.
Putting the May data to work
- Lost ground in March? Plan for the next update. Only 32.2% of the domains that lost TOP 10 spots in March came back by May, so a bounce-back is the exception. Use the time to fix the pages instead of waiting for a recovery that often won’t come until the next core update, and also might not help you. SE Ranking’s Website Audit is a quick way to run that check.
- Check your near-misses before writing new pages. Since 15.2% of the TOP 3 entrants came from outside the TOP 20 (down from 29.70% after March), this update rewarded pages that were already close. Focus on those, as they are your quick wins.
- Treat Reddit as part of the SERP in experience-led niches. In Pets, Education, Sports, and E-Commerce, Reddit’s TOP 3 presence is large and still growing. For those niches, watching Reddit threads and sentiment is now part of SERP analysis.
- Track video separately from regular rankings. YouTube’s regular share fell while its presence likely moved into SERP features. If you judge video by regular rankings alone, you will read the trend wrong.
- Don’t use one update story for every client. YMYL niches stayed stable and resisted Reddit. Trend-led niches saw more movement and faster Reddit growth. The right takeaway depends on the niche.
Research methodology
For this research, we looked at organic results for the same 100,000 keywords across 20 niches in the New York (USA) location we used in our December 2025 and March 2026 reports. We kept the keyword set and the conditions the same, so all three updates compare directly.
May 2026 Core Update
April 15, 2026
March 2026 updates
February 16, 2026
December 2025 Core Update
November 10, 2025
May 2026 Core Update
June 2, 2026
March 2026 updates
April 9, 2026
December 2025 Core Update
January 5, 2026
April 15, 2026
February 16, 2026
November 10, 2025
June 2, 2026
April 9, 2026
January 5, 2026
A few limitations apply:
- These are before-and-after snapshots, and rankings keep shifting after an update finishes rolling out.
- All domain and position shares cover organic blue links only, so any site that also appears in SERP features, Reddit and YouTube included, is more visible than these figures suggest.
Final thoughts
May 2026 will not be remembered for its volatility. By that measure, it was the quiet middle between December and March. But it showed a shift in how Google sorts the SERPs by the kind of answer a query deserves: experience-driven searches surface community sources like Reddit, video is being pulled into its own features more often, and authority-sensitive YMYL niches stayed largely untouched.
