Trustpilot Review Guide

Who uses Trustpilot

Businesses of many kinds, including online and local businesses, that want to manage their Trustpilot profile and respond to reviewers. Free features come with a claimed profile, and paid plans add more tools.

Claim your profile

1. Your business needs an active website, since Trustpilot requires one to collect reviews, including for small local businesses and sole proprietors.
2. Go to Trustpilot Business and choose Create free account.
3. Enter your business location, name and website, then your job title, annual revenue range and number of employees, then your personal details.
4. Enter your email address, use the activation link Trustpilot sends, agree to the terms and complete setup.
5. If the email address matches your website's domain, setup is complete. Otherwise you must verify the domain, for example by confirming a domain email, uploading an HTML file, using Google Search Console, adding a meta tag, or adding a DNS TXT record.
6. Trustpilot says it never asks businesses to verify through email links or external requests, and warns that verification starts inside the platform. Treat unexpected verification emails as possible phishing.
7. A claimed profile displays a Claimed label, and a profile exists on Trustpilot whether or not it has been claimed.

Official guidelines: help.trustpilot.com

Replying to reviews

A claimed profile can reply publicly to reviews. Trustpilot encourages replies to answer questions, resolve problems and build trust. If a business disagrees with a review that does not break the guidelines, Trustpilot recommends replying with the business's side of the story, because it stays neutral and generally does not mediate factual disputes.

• Replies must be polite and professional. Personal information, threats or aggressive language lead to removal of the reply.
• Replies that breach the guidelines are removed, and a business that keeps posting such content is warned and can have its account access blocked.

Official guidelines: corporate.trustpilot.com

Review rules

In our own words. The official page is the rule that applies.

• Fake reviews of any kind, including writing, requesting or encouraging them, are prohibited.
• Invitations to review must be fair and neutral: one per genuine experience, sent to everyone the same way at the same point in the customer journey.
• Offering any incentive tied to writing or editing a review, such as discounts, prize entries, refunds or freebies, is prohibited.
• Selective invitations are prohibited, such as inviting only happy customers, screening customers first, or steering unhappy ones elsewhere.
• Inviting people with a special relationship to the business, such as family, staff or shareholders, is prohibited.
• Pressuring, blackmailing or threatening reviewers to write, edit or delete reviews is prohibited.
• Collecting reviews on business-owned devices is prohibited.
• Trustpilot says payment cannot remove or lower reviews or change scores, and paying subscribers flag reviews like anyone else.
• Consequences for misuse range from warnings and account restrictions to a Consumer Warning on the profile that hides the TrustScore, and in serious cases contract termination or legal action.

Official guidelines: corporate.trustpilot.com

Reporting a review

Trustpilot's own process, step by step.

1. On the public profile, the flag icon under a review opens a sign-in or guest choice, and the guest flow asks you to confirm "I'm not from" the business: it is for consumers. A business flags from its Trustpilot Business account.
2. Businesses can flag a review through a business account or by contacting Trustpilot.
3. Valid reasons include harmful or illegal content, personal information about others, advertising or promotion, reviews not based on a genuine experience, and reviews about a different business.
4. Disliking a star rating, disagreeing with criticism, or believing a review is unfair are not valid reasons. Trustpilot notes that an expressed opinion is not defamation.
5. Harmful or illegal reviews are hidden while Trustpilot investigates; most other flagged content stays visible.
6. Reviewers may be asked for changes or documentation within three days, and the business is notified of the outcome.
7. A business can respond to a decision by replying, and can appeal through the link in the decision email.
8. Misusing the flagging tool, such as flagging too quickly or for the wrong reasons, can lead to warnings and restrictions.

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Captured on October 28, 2026; the site's screens may have changed since. Names of other people and businesses are blurred.

Official guidelines: corporate.trustpilot.com

Tips

• Reply to reviews politely and professionally, positive and negative.
• Invite every customer the same way and at the same point, with neutral wording, and never only the happy ones.
• Do not offer discounts, refunds or freebies tied to reviews.
• Flag only reviews that actually break the guidelines, and apply the same standard to positive and negative reviews.
• Keep profile information accurate and not misleading.