AI-generated images on a product site

Use one where a stock photo would have gone, and where nobody is being asked to believe anything about your product.

• A header image on a guide, as decoration above the text.
• An abstract illustration for a concept page, where the alternative is a photograph of a person at a laptop.
• A social card background, where the image exists to make a link look deliberate in a feed.
• A placeholder in a design while the real asset is being made, as long as it does not ship.
• An icon or a texture, where the image carries no claim at all.

None of these help a page rank, and none hurt it. They are a design decision with a weight cost, and that is the whole story for search.

On a product site, most images are evidence. A generated one in these places is not a style choice; it is a claim that is not true.

Nothing in the ranking of a page depends on how an image was made. What is read is the same set of things as always.

• The alt attribute, which is what a screen reader announces and what is used when the image is a link.
• The file name: pricing-chart.png says more than IMG_1234.png.
• The caption and the text around the image, which say what it shows.
• The image property in your structured data on the thing the page is about.
• The technical facts: format, dimensions, whether width and height are set, whether it is lazy loaded.

Google Images sends real traffic to some sites and almost none to others. Product photos, diagrams and step-by-step shots do well; stock-looking art rarely does, and generated art is stock-looking art with a different origin.

Describe what the image shows, for someone who cannot see it. That is the job, and it does not change because a model drew it.

• Good: alt="Illustration of two servers exchanging a file". It tells a screen reader user what is on the screen.
• Bad: alt="AI generated image, invoicing software, best invoicing tool 2026". Keyword stuffing in alt text is an old trick that helps nobody.
• Also bad: alt="image", alt="illustration", alt="" on an image that carries meaning.
• Correct for pure decoration: an empty alt, so assistive technology skips it.

You do not have to write “AI generated” in the alt text. Alt is for what the image shows. If the origin matters to the reader, say it in the caption, where a person will actually see it.

Two standards exist for recording how an image was made. IPTC photo metadata carries a field for the digital source type, which can say that an image was generated. C2PA content credentials attach a signed record of how a file was created and edited.

As of 2026 the picture is the same for both: the metadata is written by the tool that generated the image, and it is read where the platform supports it. Two practical consequences follow, and they are what actually matter to you.

• Most image pipelines strip metadata. Resizing, converting to WebP or AVIF and passing through a CDN commonly removes everything but the pixels. If you intend the provenance to survive, check your own output file.
• Nothing about your ranking depends on it. There is no policy requiring the label and no signal from having it.

So treat provenance as an honesty setting rather than an SEO one: keep it where your tooling preserves it, and do not build a process around it.

Generated images arrive large, often as a PNG with more pixels than any layout needs. Dropped into a page unprocessed, one of them can become the largest element on the screen and the thing that decides your Largest Contentful Paint.

1. 1

   Convert and compress

   AVIF or WebP, compressed until artefacts show, then one step back. A decorative illustration does not need a lossless format.

2. 2

   Export the widths you serve

   Use srcset and sizes so a phone downloads a phone-sized file, not a 3000 pixel wide one.

3. 3

   Set width and height

   Every image, every time, so the layout does not shift while it loads. Cumulative Layout Shift should stay under 0.1.

4. 4

   Lazy load below the fold, never above it

   The hero image is your Largest Contentful Paint candidate. Give it priority and keep it off the lazy list.

5. 5

   Ask whether it earns its bytes

   A decorative header image that costs 300 kilobytes on a phone is a worse trade than no image. Aim for Largest Contentful Paint under 2.5 seconds.

Generated images where a stock photo would have gone. Real screenshots everywhere the reader is being asked to believe something. Alt text that describes, file names that describe, and every image compressed and sized.

The images that earn links and get quoted are almost never illustrations. They are the labelled diagram of how the thing works, the chart of your own numbers, and the screenshot with the arrow pointing at the setting people cannot find.