Google review policies/Hate speech
Reviewed by Doug Baker, founder · Updated September 23, 2026 · Policy text snapshot August 2026
The policy reaches the two whose words call for violence or are aimed at who someone is. It doesn't reach the one whose words are aimed at the business.
The policy reaches the one whose words are aimed at who someone is. It doesn't reach the one whose words are aimed at the business.
Hate speech is Google's name for a review that attacks a person over who they are. Race, religion, disability, age, sexual orientation, and the rest of a protected list Google publishes. Two things trip it: a call for violence against a protected group, and content that dehumanizes, belittles or vilifies someone based on one of those characteristics. How harsh the review is has nothing to do with it. A brutal review from a real customer isn't hate speech. Another section may still apply to it, and that's a separate question.
Both invented. Both one star. Both unpleasant enough that an owner would want them gone. Only one has grounds.
Breaks the policy
Quoted me ten minutes for a tube change and I stood there forty. Nobody at the counter the whole time, and when the owner finally came out she argued about the price instead of fixing the bike. People like her shouldn't be running a shop on this block. Everybody around here knows what she is, [slur].
Hate speechAimed at who they are
Breaks it. The last two sentences leave the visit behind and attack the owner over who she is, which is the second clause almost word for word.
Doesn't break it
Ordered a part on a Tuesday, promised Thursday, still not in the following week. Asked for the manager three times and he never came out of the back. The kid at the register kept apologizing for someone else's mess. Whoever runs this place has never worked a busy counter in his life. Worst-run shop I've been in all year.
Does not coverAimed at the business
Doesn't break it. Nothing in it refers to a protected individual or group, so neither clause is reached and the exception for positive mentions never comes up.
The policy
One question decides it. Is the attack aimed at a protected characteristic, or at the business? Google prints the list in the section itself. Race and ethnicity, nationality, religion, caste, age, disability, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender and gender identity, and then it leaves the list open with any other protected status. A review that never touches that list never reaches this section, however cruel it reads.
Breaks the policy
Call for violence
Google names this one first. The review goes past insulting a protected group and urges people to hurt them.
Aimed at who they are
The review stops describing the visit and starts on the owner, the staff or the customers, as in the sample below. A slur aimed at a protected characteristic is the clearest version of this one.
Aimed at the business
A real customer's fury about your service, however harsh it reads. If the words go after how the business ran and never touch who someone is, this section doesn't reach them.
Two kinds of review land here. One calls for violence against a protected group. The other attacks the owner, the staff or the customers over a protected characteristic instead of over the visit. The protected list Google prints there is the test, and it ends open, so an attack on a status the list doesn't spell out can still land inside it.
A review that turns on who you are isn't a service complaint. But Google doesn't remove a review for being cruel. It removes it on policy, and under this section the attack has to be tied to a protected characteristic. That tie is the whole test.
The sample further down is the second kind. A slur aimed at who someone is, in the middle of a review about a bike repair. Before you file anything, the question worth answering is whether the review has grounds at all, which is what the free Google review analysis is for.
Does yours break it?
An honest negative review, however harsh it reads. An angry review that never touches a protected characteristic sits outside this section. The only exception Google writes into the hate speech section is the opposite case, where a review mentions a protected person or group in a positive way. The room for a negative review sits one section down, under Offensive content, where Google allows a bad experience told respectfully.
Google's reporting page says the same thing from the other side. It tells owners not to report a review only because they dislike it or disagree with it, and it says Google stays out of disputes between a business and its customers.
We say the same thing. An honest negative opinion isn't a violation, and we won't prepare an appeal on one. When there are no grounds, that's the answer. Also free. Hearing it costs you nothing, and it keeps the one appeal that review will ever get.
We don't think so, but Sterling Sky disagrees. Its guide to review policy violations lists accusations of racism among the reviews that can be removed, under its heading for hate speech or harassment. Our read of Google's text is different. A review calling the owner or the staff racist accuses them of how they behaved. It doesn't attack anyone over who they are, and that's what this section needs.
The closer fit, to us, is Offensive content, one section down in the same policy. It covers unproven accusations of unethical or criminal conduct. WebSuited's appeal-form guide for local businesses puts accusations like "scammer" and "crook" under that clause, and it doesn't mention racism either way. Google's own glossary puts offensive content at the level of extreme anger, insult, or disrespect, so that is the bar. The section you name decides what the appeal argues, so settle this before you file.
The second clause first. The section's opening line, the first clause and the exception for positive mentions are in the rest of the extract.
Content that is dehumanizing, belittling, or vilifies individuals or groups based on a protected characteristic.
Google Maps products are designed to help users navigate and explore the world around them. At Google, we believe that all people, regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, disability, age, nationality, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, caste, or any other protected status, have a right to access information and participate in its exchange without being subjected to hate speech.
Do not post or share content that includes any form of hate speech.
This includes:
Direct calls to action to commit violence against protected individuals or groups.
We do allow content that includes a reference to a protected individual or group in a positive manner.
Google, Maps user-generated content policy, Prohibited & restricted content, section Hate speech
Google's policy text captured August 4, 2026. Section headings re-checked against the live page September 3, 2026.
A slur aimed at a protected characteristic is what the second clause describes. You still have to report it, from your own profile, and Google still decides. TrueReview says this is the kind of violation the automated layer catches without much argument behind it, so keep the report short and quote the words.
Race and ethnicity, nationality, religion, caste, age, disability, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender and gender identity, and Google closes the list with any other protected status. The open ending matters. An attack on a status the list doesn't spell out can still be argued under this section.
Yes. Google's clause covers individuals or groups, and it doesn't require the target to be the business. A review that belittles the people who come to your shop over a protected characteristic is the same clause as one aimed at you.
File it yourself
You file the report yourself and watch it in the Reviews Management Tool. Open your Business Profile, go to Read reviews, hit Report next to the review, pick a reason, and send it.
Open Read reviews
In your Business Profile, find the review
Select Report, pick a reason
The pick can limit what the appeal may argue
Send it, then wait
Typically several days, Google says.
Decision pendingIf it stays up, the appeal
Report reviewed - no policy violationOne per review, ever. You file it.
The reason is the step to get right. Google's help page gives two example reasons, Spam and Profanity. Hate speech isn't one of them, and the page lists no others. If the menu you see has nothing that fits, pick the closest match to the argument you're going to make and save the detail for the appeal. That's Stefan Somborac, in the Local Search Forum. Pick with care, because TrueReview says Google judges the appeal against the reason you picked at the report step. By its account, an appeal that argues a different section starts uphill.
The tool then comes back with one of three statuses. Decision pending, meaning nobody has looked yet. Report reviewed with no policy violation found. Or escalated, with the final decision coming by email.
And there's a catch. If the answer is no violation, Google gives you Google's one-time review appeal. One appeal per review, ever. You name a policy when you file, and naming one that doesn't match your argument can waste the one appeal you have. So the filing is the whole job. You file it from your own profile. We never submit anything to Google.
A hate speech appeal argues one clause. For a review like the sample below, that's the clause about content that belittles or vilifies people over a protected characteristic. The appeal names the words that do it and the characteristic they're aimed at. If the review urges violence against a protected group, it argues that clause instead. If the review calls you racist, read the question above before you file, because by our read that argument belongs to a different section.
Words, not attachments. The appeal is a free-text box with no upload field, so the argument is whatever you type into it.
For hate speech the evidence is the review's own words and what they're aimed at. BrightLocal says to be as specific as you can, to explain the violation category, and to define any word whose offensive sense a moderator might not know. Words mean different things in different regions, even inside the US, so if the ugly sense of a word is local, say what it means. WebSuited says the same for hate speech and personal attacks: name the specific type of offense and explain why it breaks Google's policies. It adds the other half too. Write the whole thing the way an unbiased third party would. Keep your own anger out of the box. The review already made the point for you.
Google says its automated models remove some policy-breaking content on their own. Content that's hard for software to judge, they flag for trained people to review. TrueReview says explicit slurs are among the things that automated first pass catches. So a report on a slur can be short.
Or have us analyze it
Read the review's own words against the two clauses. Is the attack aimed at a protected characteristic, or at how the business behaves? If you'd rather not make that call yourself, put in your business name and we'll analyze every bad review on the profile against Google's written policies, not this section alone. We read reviews at 2★ and below that carry at least ten characters of text, and you get a verdict on each one. Strong grounds for removal, possible grounds, or no grounds. Where there are grounds, what happens after the verdict walks through what we prepare and what you file.
No email. No account. The answer is free either way.
Each review comes back with one of three:
Strong grounds for removalPossible grounds for removalNo grounds for removal
A review can break more than one section. If the review threatens a specific person or sexualizes them, that's Google's harassment policy. Foul language that isn't aimed at who someone is belongs under Google's profanity policy. And Google's off-topic policy covers a review that's just political commentary with no visit in it. The rest sit together in every Google review policy category.
