Does FAQ schema still help with answer engine optimisation?

FAQ schema no longer shows rich results for most sites, but it does no harm

Google stopped showing FAQ rich results for almost every website in August 2023. A rich result is a search listing with extra features, such as questions that expand under the link. Google said FAQ rich results "will only be shown for well-known, authoritative government and health websites. For all other sites, this rich result will no longer be shown regularly" (Google Search Central blog). How-To rich results were deprecated the following month.

The same post says what to do with markup you already have: "There's no need to proactively remove it. Structured data that's not being used does not cause problems for Search, but also has no visible effects in Google Search". For a plumber, a law firm or an online shop, FAQ markup now changes nothing you can see in Google. It also costs nothing to keep.

FAQPage markup labels the questions a page answers

FAQPage markup is a block of code that lists each question on a page with its answer. Structured data is code on a page that tells search engines what the page holds, using a shared vocabulary from schema.org. FAQPage is one of its types. The code sits in the page as JSON-LD, a data format that visitors never see.

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "FAQPage",
  "mainEntity": [{
    "@type": "Question",
    "name": "Do you clear blocked drains on weekends?",
    "acceptedAnswer": {
      "@type": "Answer",
      "text": "Yes. We clear blocked drains seven days a week."
    }
  }]
}
</script>

The markup adds no new information. Every word in it belongs on the page already. Its only job is to label the text: this line is a question, and this line is its answer.

Google says its AI features need no special markup

Google's guidance on AI Overviews and AI Mode says there is nothing extra to add. AI Overviews are the AI-written summaries at the top of some Google results. AI Mode is Google's chat-style search. The guidance says: "There are no additional requirements to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode." It adds: "You don't need to create new machine readable files, AI text files, or markup to appear in these features" (Google Search Central). A page needs to be indexed and eligible to show with a snippet. That is the same bar as ordinary search.

So FAQPage markup alone will not get your page quoted. Answer engine optimisation (AEO) is the work of making pages easy for AI answer engines to find, understand and quote. Those engines search, read a handful of pages and write a reply from the text they find. The markup repeats that text. It does not give an engine a reason to choose your page over another.

The questions and answers on the page still help

Visible FAQs help answer engines, with or without markup. A short question followed by a two-sentence answer is text an engine can lift and quote whole. Google also says both AI Overviews and AI Mode "may use a 'query fan-out' technique" (Google's AI features guide). That means they run several related searches to find supporting pages. A service page that answers the side questions, such as cost, timing and service area, gives those searches more to find.

Answer the questions customers really ask

Take your questions from calls, emails and quote requests. "How much does it cost to clear a blocked drain?" is a real question. "Why choose us?" is a sales line. Answer each one in the first sentence, then add the detail. Give a figure, a time or a place where you can.

Put them on the service page, near the answer

Questions about a service belong on that service's page, below the main answer. A separate FAQ page mixes questions from every service in one place, so no single page answers one topic in full. Keep a central FAQ page if your customers use it. Put the drain-clearing questions on the drain-clearing page as well.

Keep the markup and the text in step

If you use FAQPage markup, it needs to match the visible questions and answers word for word. Markup that lists questions the page does not show describes a page that does not exist. The simplest way to keep them matched is to build both from one list. On this site, one FAQ component shows each question and answer and writes the FAQPage markup from that same list. When we edit an answer, the page and the markup change together. The questions at the end of this guide work that way.

Structured data, crawler access and clear answers matter more than FAQ markup

Three pieces of work do more for answer engines than FAQ markup. Each one helps ordinary search too. Our answer engine optimisation page covers how they fit together.

LocalBusiness structured data

LocalBusiness structured data tells search engines your business name, address, phone number and opening hours. We checked 1112 Australian business websites across 34 locations in October 2026. 29% had LocalBusiness structured data, and 73% had structured data of any kind. The method is on our local data page. Our LocalBusiness structured data guide shows how to add it.

Crawler access

A crawler is a program that reads web pages for a search engine. Each AI search tool has its own. OpenAI says that "Sites that are opted out of OAI-SearchBot will not be shown in ChatGPT search answers" (OpenAI). Perplexity recommends allowing PerplexityBot for a site to appear in its results (Perplexity). Check that your robots.txt file lets these crawlers in.

Answer-first pages

Open each service page with the answer in its first two sentences. Say what you do, where you do it and what it costs or how long it takes. Our guide to writing pages answer engines quote goes through a service page, an FAQ and a guide in turn.

If you already have FAQ schema, keep it where it matches the page

Leave existing FAQ markup in place if it matches the page. Google says unused structured data causes no problems, so removing it gains nothing. Check each page for three things:

1. Every question in the markup appears on the page, in the same words.
2. Every answer is current, including prices, service areas and hours.
3. Every question is one a customer would ask.

Remove questions nobody asks, from the page and the markup together. Do not add FAQ blocks to every page for the sake of the markup. Add questions where customers ask them, and write the answers first. The terms used for this work vary, and our guide on AEO, GEO and AI SEO explains how they overlap.