Quality Score is Google Ads' 1–10 diagnostic rating of how relevant your keyword, ad copy, and landing page are to a user's search. It has three components — expected clickthrough rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience — and higher scores generally lower your cost per click for the same ad position.
Quality Score exists because Google auctions ad slots on more than money: Ad Rank is roughly bid × quality, so a 7/10 keyword can outrank a 4/10 keyword bidding considerably more. Each of the three components is graded Below average, Average, or Above average in the Keywords tab, which tells you exactly where to work.
Expected CTR usually carries the most weight. It asks: based on historical performance of your ads on this keyword, how likely is a click? The fastest lever is ad copy that mirrors the query — if the keyword is "emergency plumber london", a headline containing exactly that phrase will nearly always beat a generic "Fast, Reliable Plumbing".
Ad relevance checks whether your ad's language matches the keyword's intent. The classic failure is one big ad group with 40 loosely related keywords sharing one ad. Splitting into tightly themed ad groups — each keyword cluster getting its own ad with the keyword in a headline — is the standard fix and typically moves this component within days.
Landing page experience evaluates whether the page actually delivers what the ad promised: matching message, fast load, mobile usability, and easy navigation. An ad promising "Free CRM Template" that lands on a generic homepage will drag this component down regardless of how good the ad is — this overlap with message match is why ad and landing page should be written together.
A practical target: 7+ on your core converting keywords. Below 5, you are paying a measurable premium per click; raising a keyword from 5 to 8 commonly cuts CPC by 20–30% at the same position, because Google effectively discounts clicks for high-quality ads.
Keyword: "crm for real estate". Weak ad: "Best CRM Software | Try It Today". Stronger ad: "CRM For Real Estate | Built For Agents & Brokers" landing on a real-estate-specific page — the keyword appears verbatim, intent matches, and all three Quality Score components improve.
The reported 1–10 score is a diagnostic, but the underlying quality signals it summarizes feed directly into Ad Rank at auction time. Treat the visible score as a health indicator: its components tell you whether to fix copy, targeting, or landing page.
Ad relevance can move within days of restructuring ad groups and rewriting copy. Expected CTR moves as new performance history accumulates — typically 1–3 weeks of meaningful traffic. Landing page improvements register after Google recrawls the page.