Content Freshness

What this parameter measures

This parameter checks how recent your content appears to AI systems. friendly4AI collects dated signals from several sources (the Last-Modified HTTP header, JSON-LD dateModified, visible "Last updated" dates in the page text, and the server Date header), then selects the most recent strong signal and measures its age in days. Strong signals (Last-Modified, dateModified, visible dates) drive the score; the server Date header is treated only as a weak fallback when no strong signal exists, because it reflects when the page was served rather than when its content actually changed.

Why it matters for AI-readiness

AI engines favour current information and discount content that looks stale. Perplexity, ChatGPT search, and Gemini all weigh recency when choosing what to surface, so a page with no freshness markers, or one whose newest signal is a year old, is easy for them to pass over in favour of a dated competitor. Explicit, honest freshness metadata tells a model your content is maintained and worth citing today. The dates have to reflect real edits, though: stamping an old page with a fresh date without updating the content is the kind of signal AI systems learn to distrust.

How we score it

This Authority and Trust parameter uses an age-based classifier under the v4.4 methodology. With a strong signal present, a page passes (100) when the newest signal is within 90 days, earns a partial (50) when it is between 90 and 365 days old, and fails (0) when it is older than a year. When only the server Date header is available, the result caps at partial (within 365 days) or fail (older), and a complete absence of any signal fails. A newer v2.2 enhancement (config-gated, off by default) replaces the binary 90/365 split with a four-band classifier (fresh, recent, aging, at-risk) plus a Perplexity-staleness flag and a future-dated-signal guard; when that flag is disabled, the 90/365 bands documented here are the live behaviour.

How to fix common issues

• Send an accurate Last-Modified HTTP header that updates whenever the page content genuinely changes.
• Add dateModified to your JSON-LD (Article, WebPage, or similar) and keep it aligned with the real edit date.
• Show a visible "Last updated" date on substantive pages so both readers and crawlers see the recency.
• Do not back-date or fake freshness; keep every date tied to a real content update, since mismatched signals erode trust.
• Re-scan and check the freshness_days, freshness_source, last_modified_header, and schema_date_modified evidence fields.