Difference Between Google Panda and Google Penguin:

A lot of people ask us to do SEO evaluations, usually looking for how Panda or Penguin ate their site, or better put, pushed their site down in the search ranking. So it makes sense to explain the difference between Panda and Penguin and why you may or may not be a victim of one or the other or in a lot of site we look at...neither.
Before we get into Google Penguin and Panda, it's helpful to understand that each is a part of Google's search algorithm. The algorithm is a mathematical formula involving up to 200 variables that determines the rank of each website in a Google search. The algorithm takes into account many factors many factors that some SEO have no control over, such as the user's past history. One thing people should realize about the algorithm is that its super secret. Google will tell you bits and pieces but will not give you the formula. Its as secret as the formula locked in a vault in Atlanta.

What is Google Panda

Google launched Panda in February 2011, mainly as a change in its search results ranking algorithm. The main purpose of the update was just to keep those low quality and low content sites away from the top ranking results and give the actual quality sites their due.
As an obvious result, many websites with huge amount of advertising, or those with low quality content, saw a huge decline in the rankings. Ever since Panda was launched, there have been many updates to it ranging to over 22 in total.
1.Panda 1.0 (aka the Farmer Update) on February 24^th 2011
2. Panda 2.0 on April 11th 2011. (Panda impacts all English speaking countries)
3. Panda 2.1 on May 9th 2011 or so
4. Panda 2.2 on June 18th 2011 or so.
5. Panda 2.3 on around July 22nd 2011.
6. Panda 2.4 in August 2011(Panda goes international)
7. Panda 2.5 on September 28^th 2011
8. Panda 2.5.1 on October 9^{th 2011}
9. Panda 2.5.2 on October 13^{th 2011}10. Panda 2.5.3 on October 19/20th 2011
11. Panda 3.1 on November 18^{th 2011}12. Panda 3.2 on about January 15th 2012
13. Panda 3.3 on about February 26th 2012
14. Panda 3.4 on March 23rd 2012
15. Panda 3.5 on April 19th 2012
16. Panda 3.6 on April 27th 2012
17. Panda 3.7 on June 8th 2012
18. Panda 3.8 on June 25th 2012
19. Panda 3.9 on July 24th 2012
20. Panda 3.9.1 on August 20th 2012
21. Panda 3.9.2 on September 18th 2012
22. Panda Update #20 on September 27 2012 (overlapped the EMD Update)
23. Panda #21 on November 5th 2012
24. Panda #22 on December 4th 2012
25. Panda #23 on December 21st 2012
26. Panda #24 on Jan. 22nd 2013
27. Panda #25 on March 25th 2013
28. Panda #26, July 18, 2013

What is Google Penguin

Another algorithm update from Google that gave SEO experts another blow was Penguin that was launched in April 2012. The idea underlying the update was simple enough- penalize and decrease the rankings of sites that breach Google’s Webmaster Guidelines set the by the search engine.
This included lowering the search engine rankings of all those sites that practice black-hat SEO techniques like duplicate content, keyword stuffing and cloaking to name a few.

1. Initial Penguin Update, April 24th 2012
2. Penguin 1.1, May 25th 2012
3. Penguin #3, October 9th 2012
4. Penguin #4 (aka Penguin 2.0), May 22nd, 2013

Attributes	Google Panda	Google Penguin
The Idea	Penalize websites of low quality and those with low quality content.It is first introduced in 24^th February, 2011 with the name of Farmer Update in USA.	Bring down websites that violate Google’s Webmaster Guidelines and use black-hat SEO techniques
Date of First update	February 2011	April 2012
Also Known as	Farmer Update	Over Optimization Penalty.
Number of updates	Panda had over 24 updates till March 2013, last being on Jan 22, 2013.	Penguin had just three updates since its launch in April last year.
Purpose	Bring the high quality and content sites on the top of search engine rankings	Bring the high quality and content sites on the top of search engine rankings
Surviving the algorithm change	There are no two ways about surviving Panda than to make an update in the website and get rid of all those low quality pages, content and keywords. Over-optimized pages need to be checked. Websites that have been hit by Panda need to work on brand awareness and social media networks in a new campaign. The webpage(s) that have been affected need to be isolated from those that weren’t harmed.	Black hat SEO techniques need to be abolished because Penguin is smart enough to deal with all websites indulging in these practices. Avoid excessive link building, doorway pages, keyword stuffing, and meaningless and irrelevant content. Creating content for other blogs and websites and socializing content. Relevant use of keywords and absolute refrain from all kinds of stuffing.
Google released any tool to recover ?	NO	Google introduced A new tool called “disavow links tool” – see the Google webmaster central blogpost
Recovery choices for websites	Panda is basically an on-page problem, so the main changes need to be on the website. Check for pages with no or little content, as well as, for plagiarism. Creating elaborative pages with FAQs and more for a website should help.	Check for the links to find if there are from the same domain name or IP address, so that links don’t look like purchased. The links should not just be direct links to the website, because websites that have followed such polices have seen dip in the rankings. Disavow tool can be helpful in getting rid of too many links that are just associated with the keywords. Penguin genuinely focuses on penalizing unnatural links that are causing changes in the search results intentionally.
How do The algorithms affect a site?	It is possible that an entire site is affected through panda. Usually single pages of a website are not targeted in the algorithm. Panda doesn’t look for think contents but the overall content, so in websites where little original content and more duplicate or thin contents are present, those are likely to be fully penalized.	Penguin generally affects one part of the website on a page and keyword level. Unless spammed for too much keyword usage on the entire, Penguin doesn’t damage the entire site.
Does a recovery request help?	No, because the changes are overall.	No, unless a manual warning is issued, and even in such warnings, recovering is next to impossible.
Does manual removal of links needed?	No, because content is more important here.	If time permits and one wants to avoid relying totally on Disavow tool, then definitely manual link removal is helpful.
By when sites can recover?	If the duplicate and thin content has been done away with, then probably by the next refresh.	Should take time in recovering as refreshing is not frequent. Google has announced an update but with no date specified.
Detailed tips and tricks to recover	Tips to recover from Google panda	Tips to recover from Google penguin
When is the next update ?	No idea	4th penguin update going to happen soon in the month of May, 2013. source : Matt Cutts Twitter

Google Penguin is the latest update to Google's algorithm. This update is aimed at websites that are using tactics that are considered a way to game Google's searches. When Google indexes a site, it looks at places for specific keywords, some firms have used this fact and stuffed keywords onto a site, or hidden text from the user, but make it visible to Google, or they get lots of links from illegitimate websites that Google now consider to be spam. To date, we have not reviewed a site that has been hit by Penguin. Most of the sites we review end up suffering from a lack of updating or issues relating to Google Panda.

Google Panda is the change to the algorithm we see that effects a lot of people who have old sites. To understand Google Panda, it helps to understand Google's core mission. Google wants to deliver the best results for what you are searching. They do NOT want to deliver websites they consider to be low quality and this means when people go to a site from Google's search, if you go back from that search, Google notices it and pushes you down in the search rankings. Some of the factors we have seen effect sites, are poor site design, sites that don't reference their articles through links, sites that are slow to load, sites that use duplicate content over and over again. The bottom line is you need to have a well designed site and creates original content.

However, while Panda and Penguin have gotten most of the news and therefore excuses from site owners, there are other errors we see day in and day out that have nothing to do with either update. One of the most common is not updating your site frequently, and expecting to be ranked number one without any effort. Another is using the same keywords, like your company name, over and over again and finally, our favorite, having blank spots where keywords are supposed to go. How is Google going to index you without any keywords?
So, in conclusion, Panda is about getting Google to deliver the best quality websites to your search results. Penguin keeps people from gaming the system.

In simplest language, Panda checks for ON-Page SEO and Penguin Checks for OFF-Page SEO

Panda update is for the low quality websites in terms of content. This algo is designed to find out such sites with duplicate or crap/spun content and reduce there authority in Google SERP.

While Penguin is for the site that have achieved low quality back links through some SEO process that are not thematic and sitewide.

The Google Panda takes out low-quality sites/pages. The Penguin does the same but it focuses on low-quality sites that are keyword-stuffed and full of ads.