Schema.org

Schema.org

Abbreviation	schema
Year started	2011 (2011)
Organization	Google, Bing, Yahoo!, Yandex
Base standards	HTML5
Related standards	JSON
Domain	Semantic Web
License	CC-BY-SA 3.0

Schema.org is a website with rules for marking up web pages with structured data. It helps website owners add information to their pages in a common way. Search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo! can then read this information and understand what the page is about.

It is part of the Semantic Web project. When websites add code using Schema.org, search engines can show the information in rich results. Rich results are special boxes that appear in search results.

History

Schema.org started on June 2, 2011. Google, Bing, and Yahoo! made it together. They wanted websites to give information in the same way so search engines could understand it better.

Yandex, a search engine from Russia, joined in November 2011.

Before Schema.org, there were other systems for marking up web pages. Schema.org brought the big search engines together to use one common system.

Use of Schema.org was still low in 2016. A study that year found that only 17 percent of websites in the United States were using it. By 2024, more than 45 million websites used Schema.org.

Function

Websites add special code to their pages using Schema.org. This code tells search engines what is on the page. The code does not show on the page. Only search engines read it.

For example, a website might add code that says: "This page is a Recipe. The recipe is for Chocolate Cake. It takes 30 minutes to make. It serves 8 people." When someone searches for "Chocolate Cake Recipe," the search engine reads this code and can show the recipe in a box.

Schema types

Schema.org has many types of markup for different kinds of things. As of February 2025, there are over 800 types. Examples include:

• Article
• Book
• Event
• FAQ
• LocalBusiness
• Movie
• Product
• Recipe
• Review
• Video

Rich results

Rich results show information in search results. When a person searches for a recipe, they can see the cooking time and what is needed without going to the website first.

Pages that use Schema.org the right way may appear higher in search results.

Testing tools

Some companies have free tools to check Schema.org code:

• Google Rich Results Test Tool
• Schema.org Markup Validator
• Yandex Microformat Validator
• Bing Markup Validator

Example

Below is an example of Schema.org code for a movie:

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "http://schema.org/",
  "@type": "Movie",
  "name": "Avatar",
  "director": {
    "@type": "Person",
    "name": "James Cameron"
  },
  "genre": "Science fiction"
}
</script>

External links

• schemaorg on GitHub