How often do tag rankings refresh?
Like does it refresh on specific days of the week? Or a specific hour?
I feel like it’s random. 
If that’s the case, what do you guys think of making a thread to track the tag rankings refresh time?
Like every time the tags change, someone would post about it right away!
You mean Wattpad? I don’t think it refreshes on a specific day… Have you been checking it every day?
I think I remember maybe it was
@DomiSotto that talked about tag rankings being based off comment engagement and reading list adding. Wattpad sees that and is like “oh, active book. let more people see the thing.” And then they circulate the book more. So the more active a book is, the higher the ranking. Do I have that right?
Right now, they seem to update once a day, during the afternoon for me (like 4-5 pm CET), but that has varied. Once in a while, the rankings freeze for several days and then there are more frequent updates until they’re caught up. Sometimes it seems like something is also changed in the algorithm because the rankings suddenly change a lot for all users (I believe such an update happened in the end of May, when my rankings suddenly plummeted).
As to what rankings are based on? Who knows… apparently not reads, votes or comments, according to various Wattpad statements. I would bet Engaged readers are part of it though, as it’s a stat that seem important.
I think they’re supposed to update every day.
At the moment for me they seem to be updating every day around 3-4pm (BST).
A lot of the time they’ll freeze for a few days just because they get broken or whatever. The system seems a bit broken to me, no one knows what they’re based on, but one day I’ll hit a top ranking, then completely lose it. One day I was like #1 out of 230 stories, which isn’t a big thing, but then the next day completely went out of that ranking.
It’s a weird system, and it needs fixing 
It needs more stability. Back in the early days of Yuenrank (yes that’s the name of the Wattpad ranking system, named after one of the founders) it was easy to rank when they had just two genres and a top 1000/Hot List.
You just had to be consistent and keep updating 1-3 times a week and the algorithm did all the work for you. You worked your way to the top.
Then, they altered that to make a bit more fair, by closing loopholes when a very popular story updated a chapter just to stay top. It couldn’t anymore.
And a few years after that, along came the tag rankings which screwed everything up, apparently. I read somewhere that when they implemented tags as a ranking system, the website coding was messed up and it caused the rankings to be weird.
That was four years ago, and I have no idea how it works now. Maybe now “Engaged Readers” will have something to do with it, as @lisa_london pointed out.
My stories don’t seem to rank or get as many views in the same way that they used to. Even from last year, the reads seem to have halved, which is a shame. I could put out 2-3 chapters and average 100-150 reads and now, I can barely average 50-100 using the same output.
Maybe it has more to do with social media now, and which tropes/genres are popular. That wouldn’t shock me in the slightest. Engagement is where it seems to be at now. How interesting your story is, how many tropes it hits and how well written it is too.
My assumption is that Engaged Readers have been part of the algorithm for a long time, it’s just that we as authors have became privy to those numbers recently. And surely there are other stats that we can’t see that goes into it too (like how many readers finish a story perhaps?).
My biggest issue with the rankings currently is how completed stories are short-changed by it. Because updates of a story do seem to boost it, so updating regularly does seem to keep the rankings at a decent level at least (although usually not propel it to the rankings you can only dream of). But once a story is completed, and no longer is updated, it will often plummet down those rankings (I’ve tried to counteract that with fake updates or bonus chapters but the effect of those don’t seem to last very long).
The rank updates once a day, yes.
There are my latest observations, but with a warning, guys, don’t spend energy on trying to rank. There is no rhyme or reason to it. It’s seriously just better to do clubs for steady reads and hope for the best.
Some tags just don’t have enough ‘active’ books, so you seem to sit in those. Also, it feels that some books just ‘pool’ in the rank. My oldest story, with its fairly modest number of reads (40K) no matter that it’s barely kicking, seems to continue ranking in 2 major tags. My two other newer books, despite being in the absolutely same not-quite-dead state barely rank in non-major tags.
I have stories that wouldn’t circulate no matter what I do… but Trapped by The Mafia, when I started updating it a couple of weeks ago, now has audience, though doesn’t rank all that well. I have no idea if I brought people over from Radish to read it on Wattpad, since it’s a bit ahead on WP or just the updates on a fairly large book do it. I see people reading right after chapter updates. But the sequel, fully posted doesn’t have much interest?
All my new books are basically ‘dead’ without clubs.
One thing for sure, some ambassador profiles give you steady readership when they add you to the reading lists. Always, always make sure you apply for those, because you never know!
Yeah, that’s reasonable. Maybe it’s just making sense to me now because we publicly know that they are looking for engaged readers, as you said. And how many people keep updated on a story. Maybe how many people add it to their libraries, and how many comments they write? Anything that shows they are “engaged” in the story, per-se.
Yeah, I think that is unfair when Wattpad says completed stories get more reads. More reads my ass. Wattpad used to feature completed stories about 8-10 years ago just for being completed. Nowadays, it’s kinda a mess.
this.though I will say my experience is weird with it.
my current WIP I’m deep in like chapter 30 with it, and it’s hitting some major rankings. I’m writing enough to update every day and I get around 50 reads per new chapter.
One of my old (like 1 year ago) completed novels have caught high rankings literally out of nowhere one day after completing. got a ton of readers in. when I hit complete it was like 5k reads, and since it got up to those rankings its now 30k, and hasn’t gotten out of those big ranks. I have a steady readership and a few littered random votes, barely any comments, but it stays in those ranks.
Whereas a few of my other books that are completed literally a desert. I have one that I completed recently and it’s 3k, but is completely stagnant. No ranks, no reads. It’s only 3k because I pushed it badly with book clubs as I was writing.
One of my biggest books is at 40k now, but that was because I pushed it hard when I was writing with clubs and I’ve worked on it a lot but it never does well in ranks since completion. The only time it really did any good was during writing and when I was editing (because I was updating)
Completed books to me, seem to do well with users who are only on WP to read, and obviously for Wattys submissions. But the writers and rankings seem to only like ongoing stuff.
Idk rankings are weird
Very much my experience as well.
One thing I still didn’t quite figure out if the algo wants the same people coming back OR it values lots of new people checking it out. So, I am not sure what clubs are better, the spam clubs or the workshop type clubs. But, I guess, BOTH is a good answer, lol.
I stopped adding the first chapter for greetings & thank you as well on my books (I do banners instead), as impolite as it is, BECAUSE it makes people skip or browse away from it, resulting in very low ‘finished’ chapter statistics and I think it hurts ranks. But I am not sure.
thats what I find, I never know which is better, it’s crazy. I wish they would just give us something to go on 
I do that, I still add aesthetics and playlists for people interested, but I find people just skip them all together OR they’re the ones with most views until I add them to clubs XD
My stats always show 50% completion on those, so for me the choice is clear. I am too old for moodboards and playlists, andd saying thanks on its own is unpopular.
Thanks 
I get that, but I was wondering when does Wattpad’s system refresh the ranking pages?
I know how to get ranked, t’s just the weird times Wattpad refreshes the rankings. Sometimes it’s daily, sometimes it’s stuck for days.
Yup. That’s what I noticed as well. And it frustrates me because my luck is that it always freezes when I publish a new chapter. Only recently my luck has changed. Lol XD
I think also marking a book “complete” would do the trick. I saw a few books ranking with only one chapter and very few readers, but the books were marked complete.
Thanks, Lisa
Same, and I don’t wanna jinx it. LOL.
Yeah. I thought so. It’s so annoying 
I think I’ll make a thread to track when the rankings get updated.
Thanks, Mini
Amen to that!
Woah 
I’m so gonna research it!
Gah. I hate that I missed it!
I hear you. That sucks.
Anyway, I’m new here and I only average like 1-2 readers a month XD
It’s been a year now since I joined Wattpad. Am I doing something wrong? Why can’t I get more reads?
I don’t do social media :<
I’m doomed!
Thanks, Johnny
Oh. I never thought of it that way.
Is it in all tags that you are stuck for days? The easy method to fix that is go and edit something on your profile and save it. Sometimes, for whatever reason, database just stops seeing your profile. That unfreezes ranks. If some tags move, and others–do not, you hit one of the stagnant pools on that tag. It never hurts to edit something on your profile in this case either, lol!
How long has it been this steady?
Unfortunately with college and all I barely have time to write, let alone do book clubs :<
Ranking is my only shot at getting noticed.
Wow! That’s so cool 
Can you gimme some tips on how to get there, please?
Oh bummer! I watched a youtube video recently, two girls were talking about how changing the tags of your story every now and then might help. Maybe you should try it?
I still haven’t tried it. I’m collecting a few tags I wanna try. My ASD brain is doing some heavy research atm XD
I love it when that happens!
Wait what’s that? We apply for reading lists? I thought we had to win some contests for that 
Thanks, Domi
Unfortunately, it’s just true. Also, some books just… make it for some reason. Do clubs, win at life. At the very least you will spend time having fun instead of worrying about why your book is not read…