Fixing Recipe Carousel Inclusion in Google Search

Two different carousels

"Recipe carousel" is used for two things that behave differently, and the fix depends on which one you are missing from.

Google's documentation calls the second kind a host carousel and supports it for a small set of content types, recipes among them. It is built from the ItemList markup described below. The mixed carousel does not use ItemList at all; it is assembled from individual recipe pages Google already considers eligible and relevant.

Both are shown mainly on mobile. If you are checking on a desktop browser you may simply never see them. Use a phone, or the device toolbar in your browser's developer tools, when you look.

What each recipe page needs before any carousel

Neither carousel can include a recipe whose own page is not eligible. At the page level, Google requires a name and an image for the Recipe, and recommends much more. For carousel cards, a few of the recommended properties matter more than the rest because they are what the card can display or use to judge the recipe:

• image: the card is mostly a photo. Without a usable image there is nothing to show.
• aggregateRating: the stars and count on the card, where you have genuine ratings from readers visible on the page.
• totalTime (or prepTime and cookTime): often shown on the card and useful to searchers comparing options.
• recipeIngredient and recipeInstructions: they show the page is a complete recipe rather than a teaser or a link to one elsewhere.
• author and datePublished: basic trust information.

Two structural rules trip up food sites more than missing fields:

1. One recipe, one page, one Recipe block. A page for a single dish should describe that dish. Marking up the main recipe plus "you might also like" suggestions as separate Recipe items confuses which recipe the page is about.
2. The recipe must be on the page. A page that shows a photo and a link to a PDF, a video only, or the recipe behind a login is not a full recipe page in Google's eyes, however complete the markup looks.

Images that work in a carousel

Image problems are the most common reason an otherwise eligible recipe never appears in a carousel, because the card cannot be drawn without one. Google's recipe guidance recommends several high-resolution images, and asks that each image has at least 50,000 pixels when width and height are multiplied, in the aspect ratios 16:9, 4:3 and 1:1. Supplying all three lets Google crop to whatever the card needs without cutting off the food.

"image": [
  "https://example.co.uk/img/lemon-drizzle-16x9.jpg",
  "https://example.co.uk/img/lemon-drizzle-4x3.jpg",
  "https://example.co.uk/img/lemon-drizzle-1x1.jpg"
]

Beyond size and shape, the images must be reachable by Google:

• Not blocked in robots.txt. Some sites block /wp-content/uploads/ or an image CDN path without realising. Googlebot then cannot fetch the photo even though visitors can.
• Full, absolute URLs in the markup, on https, returning the image directly with a 200 status rather than a redirect chain or an HTML page.
• Not dependent on lazy-loading scripts. The markup should point to the real image file. If your theme swaps a placeholder for the real image with JavaScript, make sure the markup never contains the placeholder.
• Representative of the dish. A logo, a stock photo of a kitchen or a text graphic is not a photo of the finished recipe. Use a real photo of the food as served.
• Stable. Changing image URLs every time you re-save a post means Google has to rediscover them. Keep file names and paths stable once published.

ItemList markup for category and collection pages

For the your-site carousel, Google needs a page that lists your recipes and describes that list with ItemList. The simplest and most common pattern is a summary page, such as a category page for "Traybakes", that links to separate recipe pages. The ItemList on the summary page contains a ListItem for each recipe with a position and the url of the recipe page. The Recipe markup itself stays on each recipe page.

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "ItemList",
  "name": "Traybake recipes",
  "itemListElement": [
    {
      "@type": "ListItem",
      "position": 1,
      "url": "https://example.co.uk/recipes/lemon-drizzle-traybake/"
    },
    {
      "@type": "ListItem",
      "position": 2,
      "url": "https://example.co.uk/recipes/chocolate-flapjack/"
    },
    {
      "@type": "ListItem",
      "position": 3,
      "url": "https://example.co.uk/recipes/millionaires-shortbread/"
    }
  ]
}
</script>

Points that matter:

• Every URL in the list must point to a page on the same site that carries its own valid Recipe markup. Mixing in articles, videos without recipes or pages on another domain breaks the pattern.
• The list should reflect the recipes visible on the page, in the order shown. Do not list recipes that are not on the page to make the carousel longer.
• All items should be of the same type. A list that mixes recipes with, say, product pages or courses is not a recipe list.
• The summary page itself should not also carry a Recipe block. It is a list, not a recipe.

Roundup posts with several full recipes

Some posts contain several complete recipes on one page, such as "Five easy weeknight soups" with ingredients and method for each. That page is not a single recipe page, and marking it up as one Recipe is wrong. Google supports an all-in-one list for this case: the ItemList holds each full Recipe inside its ListItem, and each item's url points to an anchor on the same page where that recipe starts.

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "ItemList",
  "itemListElement": [
    {
      "@type": "ListItem",
      "position": 1,
      "url": "https://example.co.uk/weeknight-soups/#leek-and-potato",
      "item": {
        "@type": "Recipe",
        "name": "Leek and potato soup",
        "image": ["https://example.co.uk/img/leek-potato-1x1.jpg"],
        "totalTime": "PT40M",
        "recipeIngredient": ["3 leeks", "2 potatoes", "1 litre vegetable stock"],
        "recipeInstructions": [
          {"@type": "HowToStep", "text": "Soften the sliced leeks in butter for 10 minutes."},
          {"@type": "HowToStep", "text": "Add the diced potatoes and stock and simmer for 20 minutes, then blend."}
        ]
      }
    },
    {
      "@type": "ListItem",
      "position": 2,
      "url": "https://example.co.uk/weeknight-soups/#tomato-and-lentil",
      "item": {
        "@type": "Recipe",
        "name": "Tomato and red lentil soup",
        "image": ["https://example.co.uk/img/tomato-lentil-1x1.jpg"],
        "totalTime": "PT35M",
        "recipeIngredient": ["1 onion", "150g red lentils", "400g chopped tomatoes"],
        "recipeInstructions": [
          {"@type": "HowToStep", "text": "Fry the onion until soft, then add lentils, tomatoes and 800ml water."},
          {"@type": "HowToStep", "text": "Simmer for 25 minutes until the lentils collapse, then season."}
        ]
      }
    }
  ]
}
</script>

Each anchor, such as #leek-and-potato, must exist as an id on the heading where that recipe begins. If the post only lists recipes with a photo and a link to each full recipe elsewhere on your site, use the summary pattern from the previous section instead; the all-in-one pattern is only for recipes that are complete on the page.

The fix, step by step

Platform notes

WordPress recipe plugins

Dedicated recipe card plugins output Recipe markup from the card you fill in, and most let you set image sizes and ratings. The common problems are an SEO plugin adding a second Recipe or an Article that claims to be the main entity, image sizes set too small in the plugin settings, and recipe cards placed in a sidebar or related-posts block, which then output extra Recipe items. Category pages in most themes output no ItemList, so the list markup usually has to be added by a snippet or a plugin that supports it.

Headless and custom sites

Build both the ItemList and each Recipe from the same content source as the visible page, and render them on the server so they are in the initial HTML. If a collection page loads more recipes as you scroll, mark up only the recipes present in the initial HTML, or give paginated URLs their own lists.

Recipe videos

A recipe with a video can add a video property holding a VideoObject. The page still needs the written recipe. A video-only page does not become a recipe page because it has Recipe markup.

Keeping recipes in carousels

• Enforce image sizes at upload. Make the three crops part of the publishing process so no recipe goes live with a small or missing image.
• Generate lists from the same query as the page. When a recipe is added to or removed from a category, the ItemList changes with it.
• Retest after theme and plugin updates. A new theme that lazy-loads images differently or a recipe plugin update that changes image sizes can quietly remove eligibility across the site.
• Keep ratings genuine. Only mark up ratings from readers that are shown on the page, and do not carry old ratings across when a recipe is substantially rewritten.
• Watch mobile data specifically. Carousels are a mobile feature, so filter Search Console by mobile when judging whether a change helped.

For how Google treats recipe ratings, see fixing review and rating snippets. For recipe sites on WordPress more generally, see fixing rich snippets for content sites.