What is a Google sandbox?

The Google sandbox has spourned numerous threads on countless forums, and lots of people debate it's existence.

Basically it appears to be a term or formula, rather than a location, which is applied to new websites by Google, which suppresses them in the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages).

The theory is that a newly registered domain doesn't have any history, so is an unknown quantity. Likewise, people say you can get "sandboxed" if you trip over some of Googles rules, eg suddenly gaining a 1000 backlinks, or gaining thousands of new pages.

It is a lot of heresay and rumour, with no offical stance from Google, but I know from my own experience, there does seem to be some form of SERP suppression, which can last 6 - 12 months.

Wikipedia has a good description. Sandbox Effect - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

As with most of this type of information, you have to weigh it up and draw your own conclusions, inevitably you will form your arguments around your own experience.

As Steve says, theres a lot of folklore when it comes to the sandbox, but another name for it is also the supplemental index, which used to be searchable, but then Google did away with the switches.

This is where your websites pages can go if they aren't deemed good enough to go in the main google index, and some say this is the sand box.

I agree with sjr4x4 - and I believe I have a site currently in the sandbox.

I have fairly aggressively gone after back links for a relatively minor phrase and the site sits at page 10 below some totally unrelated searches above it

thanks, youd think big G would at least be open and honest about it and make it clear for all us little people