--- type: "Article" title: "ABC signals Google | topical authority content" description: "ABC signals explained: Anchors, Body and Clicks as the core of Google's topicality score, from DOJ remedies exhibits, plus an alignment audit." resource: "https://www.laurelinlabs.com/search-systems/abc-signals" tags: ["abc-signals-google", "topical-authority-content", "anchors-body-clicks-topicality"] generated: { by: "laurelin-site-build/2026-09-02", at: "2026-09-02T12:00:00+00:00" } status: "stable" stale_after: "2027-03-02T00:00:00+00:00" --- # ABC signals (Anchors, Body, Clicks) ABC signals are Anchors, Body and Clicks: links pointing to a page, the terms on the page, and how users behave after clicking it. Notes of a February 2025 call with Google engineer HJ Kim, filed in the US antitrust remedies phase, call them the three fundamental signals and the key components of topicality, T*. Google does not document them publicly. For sites, it means anchor text, body copy and post-click satisfaction should describe the same topic. ## What are ABC signals? ABC signals are Anchors, Body and Clicks, which Google engineer HJ Kim described as the three fundamental signals behind Google's relevance scoring. The source is notes of an [18 February 2025 call](https://www.justice.gov/atr/media/1398871/dl) filed as exhibit PXR0356 in the remedies phase of United States v. Google. The notes say all three were developed by engineers and are "raw" signals, and that they are the key components of topicality, which Google calls T*, its judgement of how relevant a document is to a query. ## How do Anchors, Body and Clicks work? The notes define each in one line. Anchors: "a source page pointing to a target page (links)". Body: "terms in the document". Clicks: "historically, how long a user stayed at a particular linked page before bouncing back to the SERP", with Navboost given as an example. T* then "effectively combines (at least) these three signals in a relatively hand-crafted way." The notes describe topicality as at its core a standard "old style" IR metric that was in constant development until about five years before the call. In a separate list of high-level buckets that make up the final IR score, the notes give ABC topicality, Navboost and Quality. - A: anchors, the links and link text from other pages. - B: body, the terms in the document. - C: clicks, historically dwell before returning to results. ## What evidence is there that Google uses ABC signals? The label is **Trial or leak evidence**, specifically remedies phase exhibits in United States v. Google. The ABC framing comes from the Kim notes, which DOJ lists on its [remedies hearing exhibits page](https://www.justice.gov/atr/us-and-plaintiff-states-v-google-llc-2020-remedies-hearing-exhibits) as "Interview with H.J. Kim Notes (Feb. 18, 2025)". These are notes of a call attended by Google's counsel and experts, not sworn testimony, and part of the text is redacted. Sworn testimony supports the category. In the [18 October 2023 trial session](https://thecapitolforum.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/101823-USA-v-Google-PM.pdf), Nayak said the signals that cut tens of thousands of documents to a few hundred include "All of our core topicality signals, our page rank signals, our localization signals." The [2025 Nayak call notes](https://www.justice.gov/atr/media/1398866/dl) say Google's traditional ranking was in the style of Okapi BM25. The [remedies opinion](https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.223205/gov.uscourts.dcd.223205.1436.0.pdf) cites exhibits suggesting a popularity signal draws on Chrome visit data and "the number of anchors". ## What do ABC signals mean for your site? If topicality combines what others say about a page (anchors), what the page says (body) and how searchers respond (clicks), the three should agree. A page whose inbound anchors say one thing, whose copy says another and whose clicks come from a third set of queries sends a mixed topical signal. This gives a testable alignment audit. Compare the page's top anchor text phrases, its most prominent body terms and its top Search Console queries. Pages where the three sets share few terms should, on average, underperform for their intended topic compared with pages where they align. - Use descriptive, topic-matching internal anchor text. - Make the body's headline terms match the topic others link with. - Check that the queries the page actually wins are the ones it was written for. ## Which Laurelin audit checks test for ABC signals? Google's T* is not observable. The new check, [anchors, body and queries describe different topics](https://www.laurelinlabs.com/audit/topical-content/369-anchors-body-and-queries-describe-different-topics), measures agreement between the three inputs the Kim notes name, as a proxy. Related checks: [generic anchor text](https://www.laurelinlabs.com/audit/topical-content/183-generic-anchor-text) weakens the A signal; [identical anchor text everywhere](https://www.laurelinlabs.com/audit/topical-content/194-identical-anchor-text-to-a-page-everywhere) narrows it; [key pages with few internal links](https://www.laurelinlabs.com/audit/topical-content/186-key-pages-with-few-internal-links) starves it; [content not matching search intent](https://www.laurelinlabs.com/audit/topical-content/168-content-not-matching-search-intent) affects B and C together; [low referring domain authority](https://www.laurelinlabs.com/audit/authority-network/281-low-referring-domain-authority-vs-competitors) covers external anchors. ## What are the common myths about ABC signals? Myth one: ABC is a new system. The notes describe old style IR foundations refined over many years. Myth two: clicks here means click-through rate. The notes define clicks as how long a user stayed before returning to the results, historically. Myth three: ABC is everything. The same notes list Navboost and Quality, including [Q*](https://www.laurelinlabs.com/search-systems/q-star-quality-score), as separate high-level buckets. ## What are the key dates for ABC signals Google? - 2023-10-18: Nayak testifies to core topicality signals in ranking ([source](https://thecapitolforum.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/101823-USA-v-Google-PM.pdf)) - 2025-02-18: HJ Kim call notes (PXR0356) define Anchors, Body and Clicks ([source](https://www.justice.gov/atr/media/1398871/dl)) - 2025-09-02: Remedies opinion cites PXR0356 on PageRank and the Quality score ([source](https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.223205/gov.uscourts.dcd.223205.1436.0.pdf)) ## FAQ ### What does ABC stand for in Google ranking? Anchors, Body and Clicks, according to notes of a February 2025 call with Google engineer HJ Kim filed in the US antitrust remedies phase. ### What is T*? The same notes call T* topicality, Google's determination of how relevant a document is to a query, built largely from the ABC signals. ### Is this sworn testimony? No. The ABC description comes from counsel's call notes filed as an exhibit. Nayak's sworn 2023 testimony separately confirms core topicality signals exist. Hub: [Topical Content](/topics/topical-content.md)