Google Cache Date = GoogleBot’s Last Access

The Google Webmaster Central Blog announced yesterday that they are modifying the way Googlebot responds to 304 requests. A lot of people know that when Google gets a 304 (not found) result for a page, Google doesn’t download that page.

However, when Google gets a 304 result, they still display the old cached page in their directory and the date displayed on the cache is when the cache was taken. Well now they have changed this so that the cache image will be the same for a 304 result, but the date will be when Google last indexed/visited the page.

This may be confusing to some people, but it is helpful for webmasters to figure out when Google last visited their site without having to go through their logs.

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One Response to 'Google Cache Date = GoogleBot’s Last Access'

Ryan - June 26th, 2008 at 11:42 am
So this is why when I check my googlebot last access date (via www.mypagerank.net) and it shows April 4th ‘08, it really has been back since then? googling my URL the home page was cached on June 23rd. Do I just not trust mypagerank anymore? Am I going down in the Serps? Thanks for any clarification.

BoxWrench