Google removed reviews and star ratings from K–12 school Business Profiles on 30 April 2025, and Finalsite reports the change applies worldwide. Parents still rate schools on other sites.
We checked 683 international schools in India on MouthShut, an Indian consumer-review site. Of those, 153 (22.4%) carry parent reviews there. Some chain campuses share a listing, so the 153 schools make 146 distinct listings. The median listing rating is 3.45 out of 5, and 50 of the 146 (34.2%) average below 3 stars. Only 48 of 145 dated listings show a review from the 12 months before our check.
That leaves a school three jobs. Find where parents already review you. Answer what is there, in public and in good time. Then give satisfied parents a reason and a place to write.
Why has Google removed reviews of schools?
Google's reason was the quality of what people posted. Birdeye's help centre says Google cited "false, prank, or unhelpful reviews" on K–12 school profiles. GreatSchools describes "a rise in prank and unhelpful submissions, often from students".
From 30 April 2025, existing reviews and star ratings came off these profiles. GreatSchools adds that "schools also won't be able to receive new reviews moving forward."
The change is aimed at primary and secondary schools. Birdeye lists elementary, middle and high schools, K–12 and pre-K–12 institutions, and religious or independent K–12 schools. It lists colleges, universities, trade schools and tutoring programmes as unaffected.
Preschools are treated differently. Finalsite says the change does not cover pre-schools or higher education, and Birdeye says standalone preschools "may retain reviews".
For a school, the star rating that used to sit beside its name in Google Maps has gone. So has the rating of every other K–12 school on a parent's shortlist.
Are Google reviews turned off for schools in India?
The sources we read describe one policy for every country. Finalsite writes that it "applies to general education school listings worldwide". Neither Birdeye nor GreatSchools names a country left out.
An international school in India that teaches through to Grade 12 fits Birdeye's independent K–12 group. If a school's Business Profile uses a K–12 category, the policy as reported means no reviews or stars show on it.
We did not audit Google Business Profiles for this study. Every rating in this post comes from MouthShut, across the 683 schools we checked.
Three checks take a few minutes:
- Open your school in Google Maps and confirm which category the profile uses and what shows beneath it.
- If you run a standalone preschool with its own listing, see whether its reviews remain, since Birdeye says those may keep them.
- Find any page, email footer or brochure that still asks parents to review you on Google, and change the link.
Where do parents in India review schools now?
We looked at two public places for the same 683 schools: MouthShut and Reddit. The chart counts how many schools turned up on each.
How many of 683 Indian international schools have parent talk on MouthShut or Reddit
MouthShut carries reviews for 153 schools, against 83 with a Reddit post. Still, 482 of the 683 had neither. That is absence on the two sites we checked. Parents may still discuss those schools in groups and directories we did not measure.
AI answers have not filled the gap either. In September 2026 we asked ChatGPT where Indian parents read school reviews now. It listed school directories, gave no figures for any of them and did not mention MouthShut.
Directories and comparison sites shape how parents shortlist in other markets too. We looked at that pull in our post on Singapore schools and comparison sites.
What do parent reviews of Indian international schools say?
We read star ratings, because stars are what a parent takes in first. We quote no review text and name no school.
Ratings below use the 146 listings described above. Our International Schools in India: Digital Report 2026 uses the same count. Some school groups share one listing across campuses, so each listing counts once.
Median MouthShut rating, all listings and listings with more reviews
Listings with more reviews read sit lower, at 3.2. One reading is that a few early reviews can hold a small listing's average up, and more voices pull it towards the middle.
The spread says more than the median. We placed each listing's average in one of three bands.
MouthShut listings by average star rating
The three bands are close to equal. A parent who opens one of these listings is about as likely to meet an average below 3 stars as one of 4 or more.
How should a school respond to a negative review?
With 50 of the 146 listings averaging below 3 stars, many schools have a critical review waiting for an answer. Start with how much weight each review carries.
The median listing had 7 reviews read. Of the 146 listings, 24 rested on a single review, and 52 had fewer than 5. The chart groups listings by how many reviews we read.
MouthShut listings by number of reviews read
On a listing with one review, that review is the rating. On a listing with four, one new critical review moves the average far more than it would on a listing with forty.
Our four-step routine for a critical review:
- Read it twice, and check the facts inside the school before anyone replies.
- Reply in public within a few working days, where the site allows a reply. Thank the parent, acknowledge the concern and name who they can speak to.
- Take the detail offline. Never discuss a child, a fee dispute or a named member of staff in a public reply.
- Fix what was fair and note what changed. A parent whose concern was resolved may choose to update what they wrote.
Step 3 carries a trade-off. A detailed public rebuttal can feel like the fair answer, but it puts private information where any parent can read it. A short, calm reply protects the family and shows other parents how the school behaves.
Our decision rule: on a listing with fewer than 5 reviews, reply to every one, because each is a large share of what a parent reads there. On larger listings, reply to every critical review and a sample of the positive ones.
How can a school get more parent reviews without Google?
Recency is the weak point. The chart shows the 48 listings with a recent review against all 145 whose reviews carried dates.
MouthShut listings with a review in the last 12 months
On most of these listings, the newest review we could date is over a year old. A parent reading them sees how the school was, which may differ from how it is today.
Building a steady flow of honest reviews is routine work:
- Ask at moments when families have just seen the school up close, such as the end of the first term or after an annual day.
- Send one short message with a direct link to the listing, and let parents write in their own words.
- Ask the whole year group at that moment, so the reviews reflect the school as parents find it.
- Never pay for reviews, offer rewards for them or draft them for parents, and read each site's rules before you ask.
- Put the review moments in the school calendar, so the ask happens every term.
Reviews also travel beyond the listing. Review platforms are among the sources AI answers draw on when they describe a school, as our post on what AI engines say about schools explains. Our study of which Indian international schools AI search names shows the other half of that picture.
If you want to see where your own school stands, our free scorecard covers reviews alongside website speed, AI answers, the admissions path and ads.
How did we measure parent reviews?
We searched MouthShut for each of the 683 international schools in our India study on 7 September 2026. For each school we read up to two pages of reviews, about 20 to a page.
A rating here is the mean of the reviews we read, which can differ from the overall score MouthShut shows. Review counts are reviews read, not a school's total. The two-page cap was reached on 24 of the 146 listings.
Where chain campuses matched the same listing, rating and review-count figures count that listing once. Counts of schools use all 683 school rows.
The Reddit figure counts schools with at least one post found across two rounds of searching. We did not collect Google reviews. The full method for the wider study is in the digital report's methodology.
Where does your school stand with parents online?
International Schools in India: Digital Report 2026
The full study behind these figures, covering search, AI answers, website speed, the admissions path, ads and reviews.
Read the full digital reportReviews, search and admissions marketing for schools
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