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Reputation Index

Trust in Online Reviews Has Halved. What the Research Reveals

In 2016, 84% of surveyed consumers said they trusted online reviews as much as personal recommendations. By 2025, that figure was 42%. We review the evidence.

By Logic10 March 2026 2 min read

About this article: this is a review of published third-party research, not an RRSource survey. Sources are linked below so figures can be checked in their original context.

Online reviews shape billions of decisions — where to eat, who to hire, where to stay. But the evidence suggests that trust in them has fallen significantly, and regulators have found real grounds for concern about their reliability.

Finding 1: Trust in reviews has roughly halved since its peak

BrightLocal's annual Local Consumer Review Survey of US consumers has asked for years whether people trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations from friends and family.

  • 2016 and 2017: 84% said they did — the peak recorded in the survey series.
  • 2020: 79%.
  • 2025: 42%, in a survey of 1,026 US adults.

Surveys of this kind measure what people say rather than what they do, and question wording and samples change over time. But the direction of travel is clear and consistent: stated trust in reviews has declined steeply.

Finding 2: Regulators could not confirm reviews were genuine on most sites checked

In a screening exercise published in January 2022, consumer authorities in 26 EU member states, coordinated by the European Commission, examined 223 major websites — online shops, marketplaces, booking sites, search engines and comparison services — for misleading reviews.

  • For 144 of the 223 sites, authorities could not confirm that the traders were doing enough to ensure reviews were published by consumers who had actually used the product or service.
  • 176 sites did not mention that incentivised reviews were prohibited.
  • The Commission reported that at least 55% of the sites checked potentially violated EU consumer law.

Finding 3: Regulators are moving from guidance to rules

In the United States, the Federal Trade Commission finalised a rule banning fake reviews and testimonials, which took effect on 21 October 2024. It covers practices including fake or AI-generated reviews, buying reviews and suppressing negative ones. The direction of regulation in several regions reflects the same concern: that review systems can be manipulated at scale.

What the evidence suggests

  1. People still read reviews — but increasingly discount them. Falling stated trust suggests growing awareness of manipulation.
  2. Reliability problems are structural, not isolated. The EU sweep found concerns on most major sites examined.
  3. Star ratings alone lack context. Reviews rarely show evidence, the other party's response or how a dispute ended — see why reviews don't show how disputes were resolved.

What would make reputation information more trustworthy?

The research points to the same missing ingredients: verified identity of both parties, evidence attached to claims, a right of reply, and visible outcomes. Those are the principles behind RRSource Reputation Records. Read also why star ratings can't be trusted.

Sources

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