Yes — and at first glance, it can actually seem somewhat random. Google doesn’t simply work on the principle of “image on a website = image in Google Images.” There are several stages involved: Google first has to discover the image, crawl it, associate it with the page, index it, and then decide whether it is relevant enough for a particular search query.
Especially on image-heavy websites, this means that images can appear in Google Images today and disappear again later.
The most important factors
1. Google has to be able to crawl the image in the first place
This may sound obvious, but it is actually one of the most common technical issues. Google still recommends embedding images as a standard
<img src="...">
element. In 2026, Google also explicitly clarified that the src attribute of the img element is the key source for extracting images.
Potential problems include:
- Images that are loaded only through JavaScript
- Images used only as CSS backgrounds
- Images inside galleries that only appear after clicking
data-src being used instead of src- Images being blocked by cookie/consent systems
- Temporary or frequently changing image URLs
2. Google needs to be able to understand the context of the image
Google doesn’t look at the image alone. It also considers the surrounding context:
alt text- File name
- Image caption
- Page heading
- Surrounding text
- Content of the page
- Image URL
- In some cases, structured data
An image called
IMG_5837.jpg
provides Google with much less information than
black-and-white-portrait-man.jpg.
That doesn’t mean you should artificially stuff keywords into file names and alt texts, though. Google primarily wants accurate descriptions.
3. The page itself needs to be meaningful to Google
This is a point that is often underestimated.
A great photograph on a thin or relatively irrelevant page has a lower chance of being displayed than the same photograph on a page whose content clearly explains why that image is there.
Google is therefore increasingly trying to understand the relationship between:
Image ↔ Page ↔ Search Intent
4. Google can remove images from the visible results
This is probably what you are observing.
Google Images is not a static catalogue. An image may appear for a particular search today and no longer appear later. That does not necessarily mean that Google has “deleted” or de-indexed the image.
It may simply mean that Google now considers other images more relevant for that particular search query.
This is an important distinction:
“No longer visible in Google Images” ≠ “no longer indexed.”
Particularly interesting: Image URLs and canonicalization
If the same image is accessible under several different URLs, for example:
/images/photo.jpg
/uploads/photo.jpg
/gallery/photo.jpg
Google may try to recognize and consolidate these different versions.
Google also uses canonicalization for web pages to determine which version of similar or identical URLs it considers the preferred one. Even a rel="canonical" that you specify yourself is ultimately only a signal to Google, not an absolute instruction.
This can be particularly relevant for websites with large or dynamically generated galleries.
