What is a good Quality Score, and how do you improve it?
By Ahmed Imran · Updated June 2026 · 7 min read
A good Google Ads Quality Score is 7 to 10 on your money keywords, 5 to 6 is average, and anything at or below 4 is quietly costing you money. Quality Score is Google's 1 to 10 rating of your expected click through rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience, and raising it directly lowers your cost per click and improves your Ad Rank. Below I break down each part and the exact moves I use to lift it.
Quality Score is the number most advertisers glance at and then ignore. That is a mistake. It is Google telling you, per keyword, how much you are overpaying for being less relevant than the advertiser next to you. When I take over an account, the first place I look for wasted money is the keywords sitting at 3 or 4, because fixing those usually costs nothing but attention.
What is a good Quality Score?
A good Quality Score is 7 to 10 on the keywords that actually drive your revenue. A score of 5 to 6 is average and means you are neither winning nor being penalized. Anything at or below 4 is poor and is inflating what you pay per click. Across a large sample of accounts the average lands around 5 to 6, so hitting 7 already puts a keyword ahead of most competitors bidding on the same search.
Quality Score is reported on a 1 to 10 scale, and it is calculated per keyword, not per campaign or per account. Two keywords in the same ad group can score a 9 and a 3 depending on how well each one matches your ad and your page. It is also a diagnostic, not a lever you pull directly. Google publishes it so you can see which of the three underlying signals is weak and fix the real cause. You do not raise the number by staring at it; you raise it by making the ad and the page genuinely more relevant to the query.
Quality Score is Google charging you less for being relevant. A high score is not a trophy, it is a discount on every click.
Why does Quality Score matter?
Quality Score matters because it feeds Ad Rank, and Ad Rank decides both whether your ad shows and how much you pay for each click. A higher Quality Score means you can hold the same position for a lower bid, or hold a higher position at the same bid. That is the practical money impact: two advertisers can bid the exact same amount, and the one with the stronger relevance signals pays less and ranks higher.
Ad Rank is recalculated in every single auction from your bid, your ad relevance, expected click through rate, landing page experience, your assets like sitelinks, and context such as device and location. Quality Score is the visible, lagging summary of those relevance signals. So while you cannot type your Quality Score into the auction, the same three components that build it are exactly what the auction rewards in real time. When I lifted Atlas Labs off broad match and onto phrase and exact match, the account got more relevant per keyword, and cost per conversion dropped from around $108 to $61.54 inside the first month. Better relevance is not a vanity metric. It is a lower bill for the same result.
What are the three components of Quality Score?
Quality Score is built from three components: expected click through rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience. Google rates each one Below average, Average, or Above average compared with other advertisers on the same search, and that status tells you exactly where the problem is. Here is what each part measures and the single most effective fix for it.
| Component | What it measures | Most effective fix |
|---|---|---|
| Expected click through rate | How likely your ad is to be clicked for that keyword, before position and format are counted, judged against competitors on the same search | Put the searcher's keyword in the headline and write copy that matches the exact intent, then cut keywords that do not fit the theme |
| Ad relevance | How closely your ad wording matches the meaning behind the keyword | Keep one tight theme per ad group so every ad speaks to the keywords it serves, instead of one generic ad covering everything |
| Landing page experience | How useful, relevant, transparent, and fast the page is after the click | Send each ad group to a dedicated page that mirrors the ad and the keyword, and make sure it loads fast on mobile |
Notice that two of the three components live in the ad and the page, not in your bid. You control almost all of Quality Score with structure and copy, which is why raising it is a skill problem far more than a budget problem.
How do you improve a low Quality Score?
You improve a low Quality Score by fixing the specific component Google flags as Below average, working through the ad group structure, the ad copy, the landing page, and your negative keywords. These are the concrete moves I use on every account, and they map directly onto the three components.
- ›Tighten your ad groups to one condition or theme each. This is the core of my method: one theme per ad group so the ad and keywords line up, which lifts both ad relevance and expected click through rate.
- ›Use exact and phrase match instead of broad. Broad match drags in loose queries that never match your ad, which drops expected click through rate. Rebuilding Atlas Labs on phrase and exact match cut cost per conversion from about $108 to $61.54 in the first month.
- ›Mirror the keyword in the ad. If someone searches the term, that term should appear in your headline. Matching the query is the fastest way to lift expected click through rate and ad relevance at the same time.
- ›Send each ad group to a dedicated, relevant landing page. The page should continue the promise the ad made and answer the searcher's intent, not dump them on a generic homepage. That is what landing page experience measures.
- ›Build a negative keyword list and grow it every week. On Bob's Automotive, a weekly negative list plus tight structure produced 730 leads at $30.31, with cost per lead down 28 percent. Negatives stop irrelevant clicks that would otherwise pull expected click through rate down.
- ›Speed up the page, especially on mobile. Slow or clunky pages hurt landing page experience regardless of how relevant the content is, so fix load time and mobile layout.
Do these in order and the score follows. I have never seen a keyword stay at 3 once the ad group is tight, the ad mirrors the query, and the page actually matches what was searched.
What are the common Quality Score mistakes?
The most common Quality Score mistakes are structural, and every one of them is fixable. Here is what quietly drags scores down in the accounts I inherit.
- ›One giant ad group holding dozens of unrelated keywords. No single ad can be relevant to all of them, so ad relevance and expected click through rate both suffer across the board.
- ›Broad match with no negative keyword list. This is the fastest way to burn budget on searches that were never a fit, and it starves expected click through rate on your real keywords.
- ›Sending every ad to the homepage. The homepage rarely matches a specific query, so landing page experience stays Below average no matter how good the ad is.
- ›Chasing Quality Score instead of conversions. The score is a means, not the goal. I optimize for cost per conversion and leads, and a healthier Quality Score comes along for the ride, not the other way around.
If you want a second set of eyes on where your scores are leaking money, a focused audit will show you the exact keywords and ad groups to fix first.
A good Quality Score is 7 to 10 on the keywords that drive your revenue. 5 to 6 is average, and 4 or below is poor and inflating your cost per click. Since the average across accounts sits around 5 to 6, reaching 7 already puts a keyword ahead of most competitors on the same search.
Yes. Quality Score reflects the same relevance signals that feed Ad Rank, which sets what you pay per click. A higher Quality Score lets you hold the same ad position for a lower bid, so two advertisers bidding the same amount can pay very different amounts depending on their relevance.
Fix the component Google flags as Below average. Tighten each ad group to one theme, switch broad match to phrase and exact, put the keyword in your ad headline, send each ad group to a dedicated relevant page, and grow a negative keyword list every week. On one account this approach cut cost per conversion from about $108 to $61.54 in the first month.
Expected click through rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience. Google rates each one Below average, Average, or Above average against other advertisers on the same search, so the status tells you exactly which part to fix.
Quality Score itself is a diagnostic, not a direct auction input. Ad Rank is what decides ranking, and it is calculated in every auction from your bid plus the same relevance signals Quality Score summarizes: expected click through rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience. So improving what drives Quality Score improves your ranking.
No. You do not need a 10 on every keyword. Getting your money keywords into the 7 to 10 range captures most of the cost per click savings. I optimize for conversions and cost per lead first, and a strong Quality Score follows from that work rather than being the target itself.
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