What is a Google Knowledge Panel?

A Google Knowledge Panel is the information box that appears alongside Search results – on the right side of the page on desktop – when you search for an entity such as a person, organization, place, or thing that Google has in its Knowledge Graph. It is not something a brand writes or publishes directly: Google generates it automatically and pulls the information from sources across the web. A well-maintained Knowledge Panel is one of the most visible and influential elements of a brand’s digital presence, because it frames the result before a user reads a single link.

What a Knowledge Panel typically surfaces

• Name and logo or image – the entity’s name and an identifying visual.
• Short description – a concise summary of who or what the entity is.
• Key facts – structured attributes such as founding date, headquarters, leadership, or other entity-specific details.
• Links – official website and, where available, social profiles and related entities.

The exact fields vary by entity type – a company, a person, and a place each surface different facts.

Where the information comes from

Knowledge Panels are automatically generated, and the information in them comes from various sources across the web. Google has said that Wikipedia is a commonly cited source but not the only one – it draws from hundreds of sources, along with open-source and licensed databases. Structured data published on a site also helps Google understand and gather information about the people and organizations described in the markup. In practice this means official websites, authoritative third-party references, and structured data all feed the panel.

Why it matters

Because the panel is generated from underlying sources rather than authored directly, its accuracy depends on the quality and consistency of those sources. Improving what appears in the panel is therefore a matter of strengthening the entity signals Google reads, not editing the box itself.