What Is Quality Score?
Quality Score is Google's 1 to 10 rating of a keyword's expected click-through rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience. It directly discounts your CPC in the auction, higher scores buy the same click cheaper and lift your Ad Rank.
Formula
The actual formula adds ad extensions and expected impact, but the bid times quality relationship is the useful mental model. A 10/10 keyword bidding 1 dollar can outrank a 4/10 keyword bidding 2 dollars.
What Quality Score is worth
Two accounts sell the same course. Account A averages 4/10 Quality Score and pays 1.80 dollars per click. Account B averages 8/10 on the same keywords and pays 0.90 dollars, half the CPC for the same position. Over 30 days at 5,000 clicks a month, that is 4,500 dollars back in the budget, funded entirely by rewriting ads and fixing landing pages.
Benchmarks
- 8 to 10: healthy; you are effectively paying wholesale for clicks.
- 5 to 7: acceptable; usually fixable with tighter ad groups and better RSAs.
- 1 to 4: costly; expect to pay 40 to 100 percent above competitors for the same rank.
WordStream's analysis of 2,000+ Google Ads accounts found accounts averaging Quality Score 7+ paid 50% less per click than accounts averaging QS 5, holding position constant.
Why it matters
Quality Score is the largest lever most Search accounts leave on the table. Buyers can push bids up, but only Quality Score gives cheaper clicks without losing position. Chronic low scores usually trace back to bloated ad groups mixing intents, not to bad copy.
Common mistakes
- 1.Judging Quality Score at the campaign level. It lives at the keyword level.
- 2.Rewriting ads without splitting the ad group. New copy inherits the same intent mismatch.
- 3.Ignoring landing page experience. Slow pages and thin content cap the score at 5 or 6.
- 4.Chasing 10/10 on every keyword. Anything at 7 or above is fine; below 5 is where the money leaks.
Put Quality Score to work
Free calculators
Related services
FAQs about Quality Score
How do I raise Quality Score fastest?
Split ad groups so every ad has one intent. Rewrite RSAs so the exact keyword appears in headline 1. Fix landing page load and match the offer to the ad copy. Most accounts see a 2 point lift in 30 days doing only this.
Does Quality Score apply to PMax or Demand Gen?
No. It is a Search and Shopping keyword-level metric. Automated campaigns use Ad Strength and asset scoring instead.
Related terms
Google Ads formula that decides which ad shows and at what position.
Google's judgement of how useful your LP is post-click.
Google format where 15 headlines + 4 descriptions are mixed by ML.
Ad spend divided by clicks, what one click into your site costs.
Broad, phrase, and exact, how Google matches keywords to queries.
Clicks ÷ impressions, measures how often your ad earns a click.
Meta's quality, engagement, and conversion rankings vs competitors.
Term you block so Google doesn't waste spend on irrelevant queries.