A rating value falls outside its scale
In the reportRating value outside its declared scale
structured_data_rating_out_of_bounds · Issue
A captured rating lies outside its declared scale or uses a comma decimal.
Severity: Medium. Correct the rating value or its scale.
Why it matters
The rating’s scale determines how a consumer interprets its number.
What to do
- Read the validated value and the worst/best bounds in the finding, including whether each bound was explicit, default or implied.
- Use dot decimals and a value within the intended scale. Declare bounds when your numeric scale differs from 1–5.
When to leave it as it is: Keep valid fractions and percentages with their implied scale. A valid 6 / 10 is not a six-star value on a default five-star scale.
What we read
We read the page’s captured HTML and its JSON-LD, Microdata and RDFa declarations without executing JavaScript or fetching remote contexts. The finding preserves the property, validated value, original declaration and source byte positions.
Incomplete capture, an unresolved reference, contradictory values or a form outside the supported parser means not checked. It never demonstrates a correction.
For ordinary numbers, absent worstRating and bestRating independently default to 1 and 5. Fractions and percentages carry an implied scale.
A malformed, inverted, ambiguous or contradictory scale remains not checked. A captured Microdata content attribute supplies the machine number while preserving the original value.
Example & evidence
Illustrative correction; this is not a live audit.
"ratingValue": "6", "worstRating": 1, "bestRating": 5"ratingValue": "4.5", "worstRating": 1, "bestRating": 5Confirm & check again
Check for yourself: Compare the reported property with the HTML served at this URL. Validate the corrected markup with the appropriate structured-data test.
Check again: Full audit — Run another full site audit. A correction is confirmed only for the same page with sufficient captured coverage and no remaining violation. Missing coverage does not close the finding.
Limits & sources
This does not verify the underlying reviews, their ownership or required review counts. Those are separate checks.
Unsupported rating forms cannot confirm a correction.
Confidence: High The finding records an exact offline validation reason. It does not establish Google indexing, ranking or rich-result display.
Sources
- Google, Review snippet structured data — Defines numeric, fraction and percentage ratings and default bounds. Checked 3 October 2026.
Editorial review: 2 November 2026