Current compliance engine
134 documented requirements mapped to evidence.
SenseApproval separates what a public scanner can verify from rendered-page checks, human quality review, regional applicability, and private Google-account requirements.
Why a technically perfect site may still be incomplete
A homepage scan cannot establish account standing, traffic quality, copyright ownership, regional consent behavior, ad placement after rendering, or the originality and usefulness of every page. SenseApproval therefore reports a public-site score, a verified-readiness score, audit coverage, and unresolved verification requirements separately.
No silent passes: Every requirement is classified as automated, rendered, human, account, or a combination. Anything not examined remains unverified.
Requirement matrix
| ID | Area | Requirement | Verification | Classification |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ELIG-01 | Eligibility | Publisher is at least 18 years old | account | required |
| ELIG-02 | Eligibility | Publisher controls the submitted site and can access its HTML source | account | required |
| ELIG-03 | Eligibility | Site provides original, high-quality, useful content that attracts an audience | automated+human | required |
| ELIG-04 | Eligibility | Publisher is not attempting to reopen an account after termination for invalid traffic or policy violations | account | required |
| ACCOUNT-01 | Account | No prohibited duplicate AdSense account exists for the same payee | account | required |
| ACCOUNT-02 | Account | Billing country and country-specific AdSense terms are correct and accepted | account | required |
| ACCOUNT-03 | Account | Identity, address/PIN, tax, and payment profile requirements are complete | account | required |
| ACCOUNT-04 | Account | Submitted site is added to the correct AdSense account and has no unresolved site-status issue | account | required |
| ACCOUNT-05 | Account | AdSense Policy Center contains no unresolved enforcement issue affecting the site or account | account | required |
| POL-01 | Program policies | All pages displaying Google ad code comply with Google Publisher Policies | automated+human | required |
| POL-02 | Program policies | Publisher remains current with policy and product changes | manual | required |
| POL-03 | Program policies | Publisher follows all additional product-specific policies for the ad format used | manual+account | required |
| CONTENT-01 | Content restrictions | No illegal content or promotion of illegal activity appears on monetized pages | human | required |
| CONTENT-02 | Content restrictions | No intellectual-property infringement or unauthorized copyrighted material appears on monetized pages | human | required |
| CONTENT-03 | Content restrictions | No dangerous, derogatory, exploitative, or animal-cruelty content appears where prohibited | human | required |
| CONTENT-04 | Content restrictions | No deceptive practices, misrepresentation, impersonation, or materially false claims appear | automated+human | required |
| CONTENT-05 | Content restrictions | No sexually explicit, compensated sexual-act, child-exploitation, or other prohibited sexual content appears | human | required |
| CONTENT-06 | Content restrictions | Restricted content such as gambling, alcohol, tobacco, drugs, weapons, or healthcare is treated according to applicable policy and geography | human | required |
| CONTENT-07 | Content restrictions | Content is primarily in a language supported by the relevant Google publisher product | automated+human | required |
| CONTENT-08 | Content restrictions | Publisher and users comply with sanctions and applicable trade restrictions | account+human | required |
| INV-01 | Inventory value | No ads appear on screens without publisher content | automated+rendered | required |
| INV-02 | Inventory value | No ads appear on low-value, under-construction, error, or dead-end screens | automated+human | required |
| INV-03 | Inventory value | Replicated, embedded, syndicated, or user-generated content adds meaningful publisher value | human | required |
| INV-04 | Inventory value | Advertising and paid promotional material do not exceed publisher content | automated+rendered | required |
| INV-05 | Inventory value | Pages remain useful and understandable even without advertisements | automated+human | strong guidance |
| INV-06 | Inventory value | Tool and calculator pages include instructions, methodology, assumptions, limitations, and explanatory value where appropriate | automated+human | strong guidance |
| PLACE-01 | Ad placement | Ads are distinguishable from navigation, menus, controls, and download links | rendered | required |
| PLACE-02 | Ad placement | No encouragement, incentives, arrows, or unnatural attention directs users to ads | automated+rendered | required |
| PLACE-03 | Ad placement | Ads are not placed under misleading labels or headings | rendered | required |
| PLACE-04 | Ad placement | Images and nearby content are not formatted to imply an association with ads | rendered | required |
| PLACE-05 | Ad placement | Ads do not obscure content, block navigation, or create accidental-click risk | rendered | required |
| PLACE-06 | Ad placement | No prohibited auto-refresh, pop-under, email, private-message, or software-app placement is used | automated+human | required |
| PLACE-07 | Ad placement | Sticky, vignette, anchor, and other automated formats remain dismissible and policy compliant | rendered+account | required |
| TRAFFIC-01 | Invalid traffic | No self-clicks, encouraged clicks, artificial impressions, or coordinated click activity occurs | account+human | required |
| TRAFFIC-02 | Invalid traffic | Traffic is not purchased from bot, paid-to-click, click-exchange, or other prohibited sources | account+human | required |
| TRAFFIC-03 | Invalid traffic | Unwanted email, software-triggered traffic, misleading redirects, and pop-under traffic are not used | account+human | required |
| TRAFFIC-04 | Invalid traffic | Traffic anomalies, abnormal CTR, and suspicious geographic or behavioral patterns are reviewed | account+human | required |
| PRIV-01 | Privacy | Privacy disclosure explains data collection, sharing, and use resulting from Google products | automated+human | required |
| PRIV-02 | Privacy | Cookie, local-storage, vendor, ad-network, and personalized-ad disclosures are accurate | automated+human | required |
| PRIV-03 | Privacy | Users are informed about choices and opt-out mechanisms applicable to Google advertising | automated+human | required |
| CONSENT-01 | Consent | A Google-certified CMP integrated with TCF is used where required for EEA, UK, and Swiss traffic | rendered+account | required |
| CONSENT-02 | Consent | Consent defaults are established before Google tags act on storage or personalized-ad permissions | rendered | required |
| CONSENT-03 | Consent | Consent updates correctly communicate ad_storage, analytics_storage, ad_user_data, and ad_personalization choices where used | rendered | required |
| CONSENT-04 | Consent | Users can revisit or revoke consent and privacy choices | rendered+human | required |
| ANALYTICS-01 | Analytics | GA4 or GTM identifiers are correctly installed when the publisher chooses to use them | automated+account | recommended |
| ANALYTICS-02 | Analytics | GA4 data reception and consent behavior are verified in Realtime, DebugView, or Tag Assistant | account | recommended |
| ADS-01 | AdSense integration | AdSense account meta tag and script use the intended publisher ID | automated+account | required |
| ADS-02 | AdSense integration | AdSense script is placed in a supported location and not duplicated or altered improperly | automated+rendered | required |
| ADS-03 | AdSense integration | ads.txt is a real plain-text root file and its Google DIRECT publisher ID matches the site | automated+account | recommended |
| SEARCH-01 | Search technical | Googlebot can access indexable pages and required resources | automated | required for Search |
| SEARCH-02 | Search technical | Indexable pages return successful HTTP status codes and contain indexable content | automated | required for Search |
| SEARCH-03 | Search technical | robots.txt is syntactically usable and does not accidentally block the entire site | automated | required for Search |
| SEARCH-04 | Search technical | noindex, X-Robots-Tag, authentication, and other access controls match the intended indexing state | automated+account | required for Search |
| SEARCH-05 | Search technical | Canonical URLs, redirects, internal links, and assets resolve consistently | automated | strong guidance |
| SEARCH-06 | Search technical | Sitemaps use supported XML, contain canonical URLs, and avoid broken, redirected, or noindex entries | automated | strong guidance |
| SPAM-01 | Search spam | No cloaking, doorway pages, sneaky redirects, hidden text, or keyword stuffing is used | automated+human | required for Search |
| SPAM-02 | Search spam | No link spam, thin affiliate abuse, scraped content, or user-generated spam is present | automated+human | required for Search |
| SPAM-03 | Search spam | No scaled-content, expired-domain, or site-reputation abuse is used | automated+human | required for Search |
| SPAM-04 | Search spam | No hacked content, malware, or malicious behavior is present | automated+account | required for Search |
| QUALITY-01 | Publisher quality | Content is created primarily for people and demonstrates useful first-hand or expert value where appropriate | automated+human | strong guidance |
| QUALITY-02 | Publisher quality | Articles, tools, calculators, and guides fully satisfy their stated purpose | automated+human | strong guidance |
| QUALITY-03 | Publisher quality | Authorship, dates, methodology, assumptions, limitations, and sources are shown where appropriate | automated+human | strong guidance |
| QUALITY-04 | Publisher quality | Boilerplate, templates, duplicate pages, and near-duplicate metadata do not overwhelm unique value | automated+human | strong guidance |
| QUALITY-05 | Publisher quality | Publisher identity, About, Contact, editorial, correction, privacy, and advertising disclosures are complete and consistent | automated+human | strong guidance |
| QUALITY-06 | Publisher quality | YMYL or finance content uses transparent methodology, sourcing, limitations, and accountable authorship | automated+human | strong guidance |
| STRUCT-01 | Structured data | Structured data parses in a supported format and appears on accessible pages | automated | recommended |
| STRUCT-02 | Structured data | Markup describes visible page content and does not mislead, fabricate ratings, or conflict with page facts | automated+human | required for rich results |
| UX-01 | User experience | Primary and footer navigation work and important content is reachable | automated+rendered | strong guidance |
| UX-02 | User experience | Mobile layout, forms, overlays, and interactive controls are usable and not deceptive | automated+rendered | strong guidance |
| UX-03 | User experience | Images have appropriate dimensions and alternatives, forms have labels, and heading structure is understandable | automated+rendered | recommended |
| PERF-01 | Performance | Server response, image delivery, scripts, styles, fonts, caching, and compression are reviewed | automated+rendered | recommended |
| PERF-02 | Performance | Core Web Vitals are verified using laboratory and field data where available | account+rendered | recommended |
| SEC-01 | Security | HTTPS, redirects, mixed content, and common security headers are reviewed | automated+rendered | recommended |
| STRUCTURE-01 | Site structure | Every indexable and monetizable page is included in a complete crawl or manual review | automated+human | required for complete audit |
| PRIV-04 | Privacy | Privacy disclosures identify Google advertising, analytics, email, storage, user-choice, contact, and revision practices actually used | automated+human | required where applicable |
| CONSENT-05 | Consent | Consent defaults are established before Google tags begin acting on storage or personalization signals | automated+rendered | required where applicable |
| DISCLOSE-01 | Publisher trust | Advertising relationships and editorial independence are disclosed accurately and visibly | automated+human | strong guidance |
| META-01 | Search directives | Robots and Googlebot meta directives are placed and rendered consistently without contradictory copies | automated+rendered | required for intended indexing |
| AISEARCH-01 | Search AI features | Pages remain crawlable, indexable, useful, and eligible under normal Search guidance for AI features; no special AI markup is assumed | automated+human | guidance |
| FORUM-01 | Community content | DiscussionForumPosting and QAPage markup, when used, accurately represents visible comment and answer structure | automated+human | required for feature eligibility |
| CHANGE-01 | Policy maintenance | The compliance matrix records the date and official sources used for its latest policy review | automated | required for audit integrity |
| COVERAGE-01 | Audit integrity | Unexamined pages, account data, rendered behavior, and human-review requirements remain unverified rather than being counted as passes | automated | required for accurate scoring |
Official source set
- AdSense Program policies
- Google Publisher Policies
- Eligibility requirements for AdSense
- AdSense account or site was not approved
- Ad placement policies
- Invalid traffic
- Privacy-related policies
- Google-certified CMP requirements
- AdSense policy change log
- Guide to ads.txt
- Google Search Essentials
- Google Search technical requirements
- Spam policies for Google Web Search
- Creating helpful, reliable, people-first content
- Introduction to robots.txt
- Build and submit a sitemap
- General structured data guidelines
- Consent mode reference
- Updates to Google Analytics data controls
- AdSense Online Terms of Service (billing-country specific)
- Google AdSense announcements
- Latest Google Search documentation updates
- Google guidance for AI features in Search