Google /goto Links Broke SERP APIs Again on October 30, 2026: What Happened

Google’s increased use of opaque google.com/goto redirect links has complicated automated collection of search results by hiding destination URLs behind redirects that require additional requests to resolve. On October 30, 2026, Serper reported resolving only the first three organic links immediately while returning later results as wrapped links that may become resolvable after roughly 30 seconds, and SerpApi reopened a previously intermittent unresolved-link issue after renewed production failures. These redirects can disrupt domain filtering, source citations, downstream page scraping, and latency-sensitive AI-agent workflows, while a successful SERP API response may not guarantee accurate or usable results. The development follows earlier Google changes including mandatory JavaScript for Search in January 2025, removal of the num=100 parameter in September 2025, and the rollout of /goto links in 2026, all of which have increased the complexity and cost of programmatic search collection. The account advises users to audit providers for Google redirect URLs, measure time to usable destination links, validate downstream handling and result quality, and notes that alternative search APIs may return direct URLs instead.

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