AI tools can pump out content at scale, but search engines are getting smarter about spotting the tells. If your blog post reads like it came from a machine, it may struggle to rank or even be downgraded in visibility. Google has made it clear that quality and usefulness matter more than whether something was written by a human, but the patterns common to AI writing tend to overlap with signs of low effort or lack of originality. There are six major ways search engines evaluate content to determine if it was likely written by AI. Here’s how those signals work and what you can do to avoid triggering them.

 

1. Rigid Patterns and Formatting

AI writing often falls into a formula. Sentences are structured too evenly. Paragraphs are balanced like rows of code. It’s technically clean, but lifeless. You’ll see transition phrases appear at regular intervals, even when they’re unnecessary. And formatting can be excessive, like list overload or predictable heading structures that make it feel like you’re reading an outline instead of a narrative.

2. Surface-Level Analysis

Search engines are good at detecting fluff. AI often sticks to summaries and restatements without offering original thought. There’s rarely a new insight, no reference to personal experience, and no reason for the reader to trust the source. The writing may be competent, but it lacks depth, and Google’s models know the difference.

3. Stylometric Fingerprints

Every writer has a rhythm. AI has one too, but it’s different. Machines tend to use punctuation like ellipses or em dashes for effect, which gives the writing a certain artificial texture. Vocabulary choices can also be suspiciously balanced. There’s often a polite, generic tone that doesn’t reflect real-world communication. This stylometric profile sticks out to both algorithms and careful human readers.

4. Over-Optimized for SEO

There’s a fine line between optimizing for search and overdoing it. AI often crosses that line. It tends to overuse keywords, especially exact-match phrases, and structures its headings and subheadings too cleanly around those terms. This robotic SEO style used to work in the early 2010s, but today, it’s more likely to get you penalized than promoted.

5. Weak or Missing E-A-T Signals

Google looks for Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. AI struggles here. It doesn’t cite primary sources unless prompted. It doesn’t offer real opinions, credentials, or lived experience. If your post doesn’t link to trusted sources, include an author bio, or demonstrate expertise in any way, it risks being seen as filler rather than valuable content.

6. Technical AI Detection Tools

Behind the scenes, search engines use models that detect predictability in language. They measure things like perplexity (how surprising a word is in context) and burstiness (variability in sentence structure). AI tends to write with low perplexity and low burstiness, which makes the text feel safe and flat. That’s another clue that humans might not have been involved.

 

The Bottom Line

Writing that feels like it came off an assembly line doesn’t just risk being boring. It risks being invisible. If you want your content to rank, it needs to read like it was written by someone who’s been there, seen it, done the work, and has something to say. Avoid the templates. Vary your voice. Speak with authority. And above all, sound like a real person.