Trustpilot's guidelines, one rule at a time
Trustpilot's rules are spread across three documents and a dozen help pages. This section puts each rule on its own page: what it says, what it does not cover, the evidence that supports a flag, and examples we wrote to show where the line sits.
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The five reasons we can get a review removed
A flag uses one reason, and Trustpilot assesses only the words highlighted for that reason. Choosing the right one is most of the work.
| Rule | What Trustpilot can remove | What it keeps online | Required first step |
|---|---|---|---|
| Harmful or illegal | Hate speech, terrorism, threats or violence, obscenity, defamation | Criticism, disagreement, swear words | None. Hidden while assessed |
| Personal information | Another person's name, phone number, email, photos or videos | The reviewer's own details. Information public on your site or profile | Edit request to the reviewer, 3 days |
| Advertising or promotional | Promotion of another business, codes, links, calls to action, scams, spam, medicinal claims | A mention of a competitor or a comparison | None |
| Not based on a genuine experience | Reviews by employees, competitors or paid writers, or not about a recent experience of the writer's own | Reviews by people who did not buy. Disputed facts. Invited customers. In general, reviews over a year old | Request information, 3 days |
| About a different business | A review that clearly describes another company. Wrong-domain reviews are moved | A vague review. A complaint about your own supplier | Update request to the reviewer, 3 days |
Source: For which reasons can businesses flag service reviews? Trustpilot Help Center.
The rules that keep a flagging record clean
Who may write a review, what a business may offer, how it may invite, how it may flag and what it may say in reply. These decide whether a flag succeeds and whether flagging puts the profile at risk.
Who can write a review
Trustpilot's eligibility rules: over 18, a recent genuine experience, your own experience, no incentives, no conflicts of interest. What each one means.
Incentivized reviews
Trustpilot bans incentives for writing or editing reviews: discounts, codes, prize draws, refunds and freebies. What counts, penalties, the FTC overlap.
Fake reviews
How Trustpilot defines a fake review, how it detects them, what it does to businesses and reviewers, and how the rule ties to the genuine experience flag.
Review invitations
Trustpilot requires review invitations to be fair, neutral and unbiased, with no incentives. What that means, the wording it bans, and the penalties.
Flagging misuse
Trustpilot treats four flagging patterns as misuse: compliant negatives, repeat flags, negative-only and bulk flagging. The rule, the ladder, the record.
Business replies
Trustpilot lets every business reply to reviews, within limits: no personal information, no threats, no pressure to edit or delete. With examples.
How these pages are made
Each page quotes Trustpilot’s own wording and links to the document it comes from. The documents are the Guidelines for Businesses, the Guidelines for Reviewers, the Action We Take policy and the help center. Each page shows the date it was last checked against them.
The example reviews are ours. We wrote them to show where a rule applies and where it does not. They are not real reviews, and an outcome shown next to an example is our reading of the rule. Trustpilot decides every real flag.
For how the rules fit together in practice, read the guide to Trustpilot review removal. To check one review against the five reasons, use the free qualification tool.
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