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name: content-dates description: "Use when auditing article or blog pages for date markup, generating Article JSON-LD with datePublished/dateModified, or checking whether a CMS template surfaces dates correctly." metadata: category: seo priority: medium difficulty: intermediate estimatedTime: "10" source: frontendchecklist.io url: https://frontendchecklist.io/rules/seo/content-dates

Show published and updated dates

Google uses publication and modification dates to assess content freshness, which influences rankings for time-sensitive queries. Visible dates also build user trust by signalling that content is current and maintained.

Quick Reference

• Include a visible published date and a dateModified in JSON-LD for every article or blog post
• Use ISO 8601 format (2024-03-15T10:00:00Z) in structured data; human-readable in the visible UI
• Update dateModified only when content meaningfully changes — not on trivial edits

Check

On each article or blog page, check: (1) Is there a visible published date in the page body or byline? (2) Does the JSON-LD Article or BlogPosting block include datePublished and dateModified properties in ISO 8601 format? (3) Does the <head> include <meta property="article:published_time"> and <meta property="article:modified_time"> Open Graph tags?

Fix

1. Add a visible publication date in the page byline: <time datetime="2024-03-15">March 15, 2024</time>.
2. Add datePublished and dateModified to the Article JSON-LD block:

   {
     "@type": "Article",
     "datePublished": "2024-03-15T10:00:00Z",
     "dateModified": "2024-11-20T14:30:00Z"
   }
   

3. Add Open Graph article time tags to <head>:

   <meta property="article:published_time" content="2024-03-15T10:00:00Z">
   <meta property="article:modified_time" content="2024-11-20T14:30:00Z">
   

4. Ensure your CMS or build system updates dateModified automatically on content saves.

Explain

Google's freshness algorithm rewards recently published or updated content for time-sensitive queries. Structured date markup lets Google confidently surface the correct date in search snippets; without it, Google must guess from page text or HTTP headers, often producing wrong or missing dates.

Code Review

Verify that Article or BlogPosting JSON-LD includes both datePublished and dateModified in ISO 8601 format. Check that <time datetime='...'> elements in the body use machine-readable dates. Confirm dateModified updates when content changes, not just on every deploy.

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For full implementation details, code examples, and framework-specific guidance, see references/rule.md.

Rule page: https://frontendchecklist.io/rules/seo/content-dates