Mueller: Featured Snippets Are Not Necessarily Chosen From The Top 10 Search Results

John Mueller from Google mentioned that a page doesn’t need to be in the top ten search results to be eligible for a featured snippet.

Shubham Davey asked if pages outside the top 10 in search results can get featured snippets. John Mueller responded on Twitter, saying he doesn’t believe there’s a strict rule like that; it would be strange.

Here Are The Tweets:

@JohnMu, could you also please add some insights here?
I'll make the question simpler.

If a page isn't ranking in the top 10 on SERPs, are those pages eligible for featured snippets?

Reference: Study by @ahrefshttps://t.co/ki84pOPmrU

— Shubham Davey (@bydaveyji) August 22, 2023

I didn't read the link, but I don't think there's any hard rule like that; that would be weird.

— John is updating his unnamed profile name #ok (@JohnMu) August 22, 2023

Pete Meyers From Moz Also Shared His Perspective:

When Featured Snippets were promoted from another position, we observed they almost always came from page one (skewed toward the top 3-4), but that seemed to change when Featured Snippets began to count as true #1 organic.

— Dr. Pete Meyers (@dr_pete) August 22, 2023

So, Here Is The Highlights:

• Google says a page doesn’t have to be in the top 10 results to be a featured snippet.
• Featured snippets are short answers shown at the top of searches.
• This means Google values giving direct responses to users, even if the page isn’t ranked high. These snippets offer fast info and can bring lots of visitors.
• To have a better shot at being featured, SEO plans should aim to give clear and direct replies to usual user questions.