How to Remove a Google Review From Your Business Profile

Can You Delete a Google Review Yourself?

No. Google gives an owner two tools for a customer's review, a public reply and a report, and neither one deletes it on your say-so. The customer who wrote a review is the only person who can delete it, and Google removes the ones that break its policies, after a report or when its spam filters catch them first.

That leaves three outcomes for a review you want gone. Google removes it after a report. The customer edits or deletes it after you've put things right. Or it stays up, with your reply underneath it for every reader who comes after.

Which Reviews Google Will Remove, and Which Ones Stay

Google removes a review when it breaks the prohibited and restricted content policy for Maps. These are the categories that come up on a business profile:

• Fake engagement. A review that isn't based on a real experience, one paid for in cash or in kind, a batch posted from several accounts by one person, or a review a competitor posted to damage the business.
• Conflicts of interest. Reviews from current or former employees, or from anyone whose business or family ties make the review biased.
• Harassment and hate speech. Threats, doxxing, and content that attacks people over race, religion, disability or another protected trait.
• Offensive content and profanity. Attacks on individuals, deliberately provocative posts, unsubstantiated accusations of unethical or criminal behavior, and profanity used to offend or to hammer home a criticism.
• Personal information. A review that posts somebody's full name or last name, face, or financial or medical details without consent. Google does allow the name of a professional who does business under it, contractors included, and a name that's part of the business's own name.
• Off-topic and promotional posts. General political or social commentary and personal rants, plus reviews carrying phone numbers, email addresses or links.
• Repetitive content. The same text posted again and again, from one account or several.

A real customer describing a bad experience stays up, even when the account feels unfair to you. Google allows reviews that describe negative experiences respectfully, and its reporting help is blunt about the rest: don't report a review just because you disagree with it, because Google doesn't get involved in conflicts between businesses and their customers.

How to Report a Google Review for Removal

Report the review from the profile while you're signed in to the Google account that manages it. Google's steps:

1. Go to your Business Profile and select Read reviews.
2. Next to the review, select the report icon.
3. Choose the reason that matches the rule it breaks, such as spam or profanity.
4. Select Send report.

Google's Reviews Management Tool does the same job from one screen and keeps a record of every report. Confirm the account, select the business, choose Report a new review for removal, then select Report beside the review and give the reason.

When one person is behind several fake reviews, report the reviewer as well. In the Google Maps app, open your business's reviews, tap the reviewer's name, open the menu at the top right of their profile, and choose Report.

What Happens After You Report a Review

Google says review evaluation typically takes several days. The Reviews Management Tool shows where each report stands:

• Decision pending. The review is flagged and hasn't been evaluated yet.
• Report reviewed. Google evaluated the review, found no policy violation, and left it up.
• Escalated. An appeal is under review, and the final decision comes by email.

If a report comes back with no violation and you still believe the review breaks a policy, the tool offers a one-time appeal. Choose Check the status of a review I reported previously and appeal options, select Appeal eligible reviews, pick up to 10 reviews, and fill out the form. Google emails the result: a review that breaks policy comes down, and one that complies stays live.

Two situations have their own routes. A sudden run of 1-star and 2-star reviews followed by somebody demanding money to remove them is an extortion scam, and Google handles those through a separate extortion report form, with screenshots of every demand as evidence. A review you believe breaks the law goes through Google's legal removal request for content that violates local law.

Why Replying Usually Beats Fighting a Review

A review that describes a real job, with nothing in it Google's policy bars, stays up however one-sided it feels, so for that review the reply is the part you control. Google's help points out that negative reviews aren't always a sign of poor service, and that a constructive reply with a follow-up on the complaint can lead a customer to update the review.

The customer is notified when you reply and can change the review afterward. Everybody else sees the exchange too. The next customers comparing you with the business beside you read how you handled a complaint, and a calm, specific answer shows them how you deal with a problem.

How to respond to Google reviews has example replies to a 5-star, a mixed and an unfair 1-star review. Owners who'd rather hand off the whole routine, from the ask after each job to the replies and the reports, use our review management.

What Never to Do About a Bad Review

The shortcuts owners reach for after a bad review either break Google's policy or feed a scam, and the policy breaks can cost the whole profile.

• Burying it under fake reviews. Reviews from friends, family, employees or anybody who wasn't a customer count as fake engagement or conflicts of interest, and Google removes them.
• Offering something to change or remove it. A discount, a refund or a free service in exchange for an edited or deleted review is an incentive, and Google prohibits incentives for posting, revising or removing a review.
• Asking only the customers you expect to be happy. Selective asking is banned too, along with asking for particular wording and pressing customers to write a review on the spot. Ask every customer, after the job, through your profile's own review link.
• Paying whoever offers to make it disappear. Google's advice on review extortion is never to engage or pay, since paying invites more attempts and still may not get the reviews removed.
• Starting a new profile to escape it. Google allows one profile per business, and a second listing is a duplicate it keeps out of Search and Maps.

The penalties go past losing the fake reviews. Under its restrictions for policy violations, Google can stop a profile from receiving new reviews for a set period, unpublish its existing reviews for a set period, and show customers a warning that fake reviews were removed. Google says it emails the owner before applying a restriction.