Structured data labels that tell machines what a page means.

Structured data is a standard format for describing what a page is about, so machines can read the meaning and not just the words. Prefer’s free schema generator builds clean structured data for common types, and Prefer shows whether engines then cite the page. Google defines it as “a standardized format for providing information about a page and classifying the page content.”

How structured data works#

Most structured data uses the schema.org vocabulary, a shared set of types (Organization, Product, Article, Person) and properties (name, price, author). You place it in the page’s code, where search engines read it alongside the visible text.

Google accepts three formats:

• JSON-LD, a script block in the page. Google recommends it as the easiest to maintain.
• Microdata, attributes added to your HTML tags.
• RDFa, another attribute-based format.

Google says all three are fine as long as the markup is valid.

A concrete example#

A software company’s homepage might include this JSON-LD:

{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "Organization",
  "name": "Example Co",
  "url": "https://example.com",
  "sameAs": [
    "https://www.linkedin.com/company/example-co",
    "https://github.com/example-co"
  ]
}

It tells a machine, without guessing, that this site belongs to an organization called Example Co and that those profiles are the same entity. That helps tie your brand together as one knowledge graph entity.

Why structured data matters for AI search visibility#

Be honest about the size of the effect. Google says that to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, there is no special schema.org structured data you need to add, and no new machine-readable files. Its advice is to make sure structured data matches the visible text on the page.

So structured data is hygiene. It labels your page clearly, which can help an engine understand it, but it is not what earns a citation. Content worth quoting and presence on the sources engines already trust do that. Our answer on whether schema helps AI citations goes deeper.

Common confusions#

• Structured data vs schema markup. Structured data is the general idea. Schema markup is the schema.org way of doing it, which is what most sites use.
• “Markup guarantees a rich result.” It does not. Google says structured data does not guarantee rich results, and it advises fewer but complete and accurate properties over many sloppy ones.
• “FAQ markup still shows in Google.” Google stopped showing FAQ rich results on 7 May 2026. Use FAQPage only where a page really has a question block.
• Hidden markup. Google’s structured data guidelines say not to mark up content readers cannot see. Spammy markup can earn a manual action that removes rich result eligibility.

How to do it well#

1. Add Organization with sameAs on your homepage, and BreadcrumbList site-wide.
2. Add types that match each page’s real content: Product, Article, FAQPage only on real question blocks.
3. Validate with Google’s Rich Results Test.
4. Confirm every value matches the visible page, then stop tuning.

How Prefer helps#

Build markup with the free schema generator or FAQ schema generator. Then use Prefer to see whether ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews and AI Mode actually cite your pages.