<b>Why your microdata is invisible and your JSON-LD isn't</b>

<b>Why your microdata is invisible and your JSON-LD isn't</b>

Google's been clear for years it prefers JSON-LD, but the under-discussed reason is the render pipeline. Microdata and RDFa are parsed during the same pass that processes the DOM — meaning JavaScript that rewrites your markup post-render can quietly desync your structured data from what users see.

JSON-LD injected via <code>&lt;script&gt;</code> tags sidesteps most of this, but here's the gotcha sources keep tripping on: JSON-LD added by client-side JS only counts if Google's rendering completes, and it frequently lags.

What it means for you — ship JSON-LD server-side, never client-injected, and never mix two formats on one entity; conflicting microdata and JSON-LD on the same product is a known cause of silent ignore. Watch this: the Rich Results Test shows rendered output, not raw HTML.