Every year, someone predicts the death of backlinks. And every year, the data proves them wrong. In 2026, with AI-generated content flooding search results at an unprecedented scale, backlinks remain one of the most powerful ranking signals in Google’s algorithm. If anything, they matter more now than they did five years ago.
Here’s the reality: Google needs a way to separate trustworthy, authoritative content from the ocean of mediocre pages being published every single day. Backlinks are still how it does that. Let me walk you through why, what the data says, and how you can earn the links that actually move the needle for your site.
Why Do Backlinks Still Matter in 2026?
Google has confirmed multiple times that links are one of its top three ranking signals, right alongside content quality and RankBrain. That hasn’t changed. Andrey Lipattsev, a Senior Search Quality Strategist at Google, said it plainly in a Q&A session years ago, and nothing in Google’s public communications since has walked that back.
The numbers tell the same story. Backlinko’s analysis of 11.8 million Google search results found a clear correlation: pages with more backlinks consistently rank higher. The number one result in Google has an average of 3.8 times more backlinks than positions two through 10. That’s not a subtle difference.
Then there’s the other side of the coin. Ahrefs published a study showing that 90.63% of all pages on the web get zero organic traffic from Google. Zero. The most common reason? Those pages have no backlinks pointing to them. Without links, most content is essentially invisible to search engines.
Think of backlinks as votes of confidence from other websites. When a reputable site links to your page, it’s telling Google, “This content is worth referencing.” The more quality votes you collect, the more Google trusts your site. It’s simple, and it still works.
How Do Backlinks Build Authority for Every Type of Website?
One of the biggest misconceptions out there is that backlinks only matter for blogs or content sites. That’s not true. Domain authority, the overall trustworthiness of your website in Google’s eyes, affects every page on your site. And backlinks are the primary way you build it.
For e-commerce sites, backlinks from product reviews, industry roundups, and supplier directories help category and product pages rank for competitive commercial keywords. A link from a well-known review site to your product page can outperform months of on-page optimization alone.
For local businesses, links from local news outlets, chambers of commerce, community organizations, and industry directories build local authority. Google’s local algorithm weighs link signals heavily when deciding which businesses appear in the map pack and local search results.
For SaaS companies, backlinks from tech publications, comparison sites, and integration partners establish credibility in crowded markets. When potential customers are searching for solutions, the SaaS sites with strong link profiles consistently outrank competitors with thinner ones.
For blogs and publishers, the connection is even more direct. Every quality link you earn increases the likelihood that your next piece of content will rank faster and higher. Your backlink profile is essentially your publication’s reputation score.
The principle is universal. Regardless of your business model, backlinks tell search engines that your site deserves attention and trust.
What Matters More: Quality or Quantity of Backlinks?
Both matter, but quality wins every time when you have to choose. One link from a highly authoritative, relevant website can have more impact than 50 links from low-quality directories or spammy blogs.
Google’s algorithms have gotten remarkably good at evaluating link quality. They look at relevance (does the linking site relate to your topic?), authority (is the linking site itself trusted?), and context (does the link appear naturally within useful content?). A backlink from a respected industry publication within an article that’s genuinely about your topic carries enormous weight.
That said, quantity still plays a role. The Backlinko study found that the total number of referring domains correlates strongly with higher rankings. You need both breadth and depth in your link profile. A site with 200 links from 200 different quality domains will generally outperform a site with 200 links from five domains.
The rule of thumb: pursue quality first, then build volume over time. Never sacrifice relevance and trustworthiness for raw numbers. Google’s spam detection, particularly its SpamBrain system, is better than ever at identifying manipulative link patterns. Shortcuts that worked in 2015 will get you penalized in 2026.
How Does AI Content Saturation Make Backlinks Even More Important?
This is the big shift. Since late 2024 and into 2025 and 2026, AI tools have made it trivially easy to publish content at scale. Millions of pages are being generated and indexed every week. Much of it is competent enough to pass a surface-level quality check, but it lacks originality, expertise, and the kind of authority signals Google needs to rank it confidently.
When everyone can create content, content alone stops being a differentiator. Google needs external signals to determine which pages deserve visibility. Backlinks are the most reliable of those signals because they’re hard to fake at scale. A real link from a real, authoritative website is something AI content farms can’t easily manufacture.
Google’s March 2024 core update and subsequent updates have explicitly targeted low-quality, scaled content. The sites that survived and thrived through those updates almost universally had strong, natural backlink profiles. Links served as evidence that real humans and real organizations found their content valuable enough to reference.
In a world saturated with AI content, backlinks are essentially proof of authenticity. They signal that your content was created by someone with genuine expertise, reviewed by others in your field, and deemed worthy of citation. That signal is only going to become more valuable as AI content volume continues to grow.
What Are the Best Ways to Earn Backlinks in 2026?
Earning quality links requires effort, but the strategies are straightforward. Here’s what actually works right now.
- Create original research and data. Nothing attracts backlinks like proprietary data. Run a survey, analyze your internal metrics, or compile industry statistics that don’t exist elsewhere. Journalists, bloggers, and other content creators need data to cite, and if you’re the source, you get the link.
- Build genuine relationships in your industry. Comment thoughtfully on other people’s work. Share their content. Attend industry events (virtual or in-person). The people who link to you most often are the people who know you exist and respect your work.
- Pursue digital PR. Pitch stories to journalists using platforms like Help a Reporter Out (HARO) or its successors, Connectively and similar services. Offer expert commentary on trending topics. One placement in a major publication can generate dozens of secondary links as other sites reference the same story.
- Create genuinely useful tools and resources. Free calculators, templates, checklists, and interactive tools earn links naturally because people want to share things that help their audience. A well-built free resource can generate backlinks for years.
- Update and improve existing content. Find outdated resources in your niche that other sites are already linking to. Create a better, more current version, then reach out to the sites linking to the old resource and let them know yours exists. This is sometimes called the “skyscraper” technique, and it still works because it provides genuine value to the linking site.
- Guest contributions on reputable sites. Writing for established publications in your industry puts your expertise in front of new audiences and earns relevant, authoritative links back to your site. Focus on publications you’d be proud to appear in, not sites that exist solely to host guest posts.
The common thread in all of these: you’re creating or doing something worth linking to. That’s always been the foundation of sustainable link building, and it hasn’t changed.
The Deal With Backlinks in 2026
Backlinks are what makes the authority of your site go up no matter what type of website you run. They remain the most reliable way to signal trust, relevance, and credibility to search engines in 2026 and beyond. The data supports it, Google confirms it, and the rise of AI content has only amplified their importance as a differentiator.
You don’t need thousands of links to see results. You need a consistent strategy focused on earning quality links from relevant, trustworthy sources over time. Start with one approach from the list above, whether that’s creating original research, building industry relationships, or pursuing digital PR. Do it consistently for 90 days, measure what you earn, and build from there.
The sites that invest in their backlink profiles now are the ones that will dominate search results for years to come. That’s not a prediction. It’s what the last 13 years of data have shown, over and over again.
