# Review Schema: What the Schema.org Review Type Is

> What the Schema.org Review type is, which properties Google asks for in a review, what rules apply and how to mark up customer reviews on a product page.

URL: https://clione.ai/glossary/review-schema/
Lang: en

Under the photo and the price, many product pages have a list of reviews: "Fits me perfectly, the fabric is cool", four stars, Marta, August 12. Each of those reviews, when described for machines, is a Review node. It is a [Schema.org](/glossary/schema-org/) type, written in English because it is a name in the vocabulary. **Review is one specific review, with author, rating and text; not the average of all of them**, which has its own type, [AggregateRating](/glossary/aggregaterating/). It matters to you because it is the part of your [product page's](/glossary/product-page/) [structured data](/glossary/structured-data/) with the most rules about where it comes from: who wrote the review, whether it is visible and whether it was paid for.

## How it works

Schema.org defines Review as a review of an item, and gives a restaurant, a movie or a shop as examples. It is a creative work (CreativeWork), like an article or a video, and its own properties say what is reviewed (`itemReviewed`), the text (`reviewBody`), the rating (`reviewRating`), the specific aspect being rated (`reviewAspect`) and the points for and against (`positiveNotes` and `negativeNotes`).[^schema-org-review] The author and the date it inherits from CreativeWork, as `author` and `datePublished`. Schema.org makes one clarification that avoids a mix-up: `reviewRating` is the rating the review gives the item; `aggregateRating`, applied to a review, would be the rating others give the review itself.[^schema-org-review]

Google uses Review for the review snippet, which can show stars and a summary in [rich results](/glossary/rich-results/) or in the knowledge panel. It accepts reviews of books, courses, events, movies, recipes, apps and [Product](/glossary/product-schema/), among others, and of local businesses or organizations only when the site collects reviews about others.[^google-review-snippet] What it asks for in each review:[^google-review-snippet]

| Property                    | What Google requires                                                                                                                                                        |
| --------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| `author`                    | Required. A person or organization with a valid name, under 100 characters. "50% off until Saturday" is not a name[^google-review-snippet]                                  |
| `itemReviewed`              | Required if the review stands alone. If it sits inside the product with the `review` property, it is omitted: Google understands that the containing product is being rated |
| `reviewRating.ratingValue`  | Required. The rating, with a decimal point: `4.4`, never `4,4`                                                                                                              |
| `bestRating`, `worstRating` | Recommended. If missing, Google assumes a scale of 1 to 5                                                                                                                   |
| `datePublished`             | Recommended. The date of the review, in ISO 8601 format                                                                                                                     |

There is a nuance few stores take advantage of: **an individual review can go without a rating if the marked-up content has an author and a date**.[^google-review-snippet] A review written without stars is still a valid Review.

The rules weigh as much as the properties. Google asks that marked-up reviews **be visible on the page**, with their text and rating; that they be about a specific item, not a category or a list; that, if you mark up several reviews, you also mark up their average; and that you not gather reviews or ratings from other sites.[^google-review-snippet] Since January 15, 2025 it recommends accepting only ratings that arrive with a comment and the author's name, and on November 12, 2025, in a clarification about nesting, it added that you should not use several ways of indicating what is being rated at the same time.[^google-updates] On July 24, 2026 it added one more guideline: **no fake reviews and no incentivized reviews without disclosure**.[^google-updates] The guideline gives two examples: reviews that don't come from a real experience with the product, and reviews written in exchange for money, discounts, vouchers or free products without saying so clearly and visibly.[^google-review-snippet]

## In a store

**A made-up example.** A shirt's product page in an invented store shows two [customer reviews](/glossary/product-reviews/), with name, date, stars and text, and the average of the two. The product node carries the two reviews and their average:

```json
{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "Product",
  "name": "Calella linen shirt, blue",
  "review": [
    {
      "@type": "Review",
      "author": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Marta G." },
      "datePublished": "2026-08-12",
      "reviewRating": { "@type": "Rating", "ratingValue": "4" },
      "reviewBody": "It fits me perfectly and the fabric is cool. It wrinkles quite a bit."
    },
    {
      "@type": "Review",
      "author": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Jordi P." },
      "datePublished": "2026-09-03",
      "reviewRating": { "@type": "Rating", "ratingValue": "5" },
      "reviewBody": "I ordered the M and the size is the usual one."
    }
  ],
  "aggregateRating": {
    "@type": "AggregateRating",
    "ratingValue": "4.5",
    "reviewCount": "2"
  }
}
```

What the example shows. The reviews carry no `itemReviewed` because they sit inside the product.[^google-review-snippet] They carry no `bestRating` because the store scores from 1 to 5, the scale Google assumes.[^google-review-snippet] The names are what each customer signs on the page, as is. And because there are several reviews, the node also carries their average, with the same numbers the customer sees.[^google-review-snippet] If the page showed only the three latest reviews out of forty, the marked-up reviews would be those three, because what the customer can't read on the page isn't marked up; the average of the forty can go in the node if the page shows it.[^google-review-snippet]


Marking up pros and cons on your store's product page expecting them to show in Google. The `positiveNotes` and `negativeNotes` properties exist in Schema.org, but Google only shows pros and cons on **editorial product review pages, not on a merchant's product pages or in customer reviews**.[^google-product-snippet] If you want to summarize what your customers say, the place for it is the page's text.


## How to check it

1. **Search for `"@type": "Review"` in the source code of a page with customer reviews** and count the nodes.
2. **Compare them with the reviews the customer sees**: the same author, the same date, the same rating and the same text. A marked-up review that can't be read on the page doesn't belong.[^google-review-snippet]
3. **Check each one's author.** It has to be the name of a person or organization, under 100 characters, not a slogan or a promotion.[^google-review-snippet]
4. **If there are several reviews, also look for `aggregateRating`** on the same product, with the average and the count the page shows.[^google-review-snippet]
5. **Run the URL through the [Rich Results Test](/glossary/rich-results-test/)** to see whether it detects the review snippet and with what errors or warnings.

## Related concept: AggregateRating

Review and AggregateRating are marked up together and do not replace each other. **Review is one opinion; AggregateRating is the average of many, with their count.** Google asks that, if you mark up several individual reviews, you also mark up their average, and says that for an evaluation of an item made by many people the type is AggregateRating.[^google-review-snippet] The stars with the number of reviews come from the second; a customer's text with their name, from the first. And before being marked up, what your customers write are [product reviews](/glossary/product-reviews/), which have their own entry.

To go further, the [structured data reading path](/learn/structured-data/) orders the rest of the terms, and the [AggregateRating](/glossary/aggregaterating/) entry explains the average, the scale and where the numbers can come from.