Entity Type
An entity type is the kind of thing an entity is, such as a person, an organization, a local business, a place or an event. Google's Knowledge Graph Search API lists types like these for the people, places and things in Google's Knowledge Graph, and it uses the standard Schema.org vocabulary for the type names.
Source: Google for Developers, Google Knowledge Graph Search API, checked October 29, 2026
What Entity Type means for your business
If you came here choosing between an LLC and a corporation, that's the legal meaning, and a question for your accountant or lawyer. Databases use the phrase too, for a kind of record. In search, the type is the kind of thing search engines take you to be.
Some glossaries call this entity categorization. A bakery and a band can share a name, and saying which kind of thing you are is a plain way to tell them apart.
On your own site, we'd say it in plain words in the first line of your About page, then match it in your schema code. In the code, pick the narrowest type Google's local business guide allows, so a bakery says Bakery and not just LocalBusiness, and make your Google Business Profile category say the same.
If AI answers call you a different kind of business than you are, setting the record straight on what you do comes first.
Last reviewed October 29, 2026. All terms
How AI answers it today
On October 29, 2026, Google's AI Overview read the phrase as a legal business structure and cited Stripe, the IRS, Indeed and law and accounting firms. ChatGPT gave the database meaning, cited no sources and asked whether we meant databases, software or knowledge graphs.
Our run through ChatGPT and Google's AI Overview, October 29, 2026. A sample, not what every buyer sees.
Related terms in entities and the knowledge graph
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