The Q-Score: your place in the queue

The Q is a queue

The Q in SwayQ is literal. It stands for queue: your place in line. A Q-Score of 847 means 847th in your category right now. It is not a percentage, not a grade, not a star rating. It is a position, and lower is better. Number 1 is the best, like a world ranking in tennis or an Elo rating in chess. One position, one truth, for both sides of the marketplace.

How the ranking works

Under the hood, the Q-Score is computed by an Elo-like rating system. Every creator's verified data feeds a composite rating, and creators in the same category are ordered by it. You never see the composite number, and neither do brands. What you see is the position it produces, because the position is what carries meaning: it tells you exactly where you stand against everyone else in your category, and it tells a brand in one glance whether a creator is worth their time.

What the algorithm considers

We publish what goes in. The ranking considers:

• Engagement quality.Real interactions from real people, weighted for depth, not raw like counts.
• Audience authenticity.Verified follower data straight from the platforms. Bought followers and bot audiences hurt, never help.
• Cross-platform consistency.Creators who perform across platforms rank stronger than one-platform spikes.
• Content velocity.A steady, active publishing rhythm. The ranking favors creators who are consistently in the game.
• Category relevance.How clearly your content matches the category you are ranked in.

What we never publish

We never publish the weights, and we never publish the thresholds. If we exposed the formula, the ranking would be gamed within weeks, and a gamed ranking is worthless to everyone, including the creators who play fair. If we simplified it, brands would not trust it. The trade we offer instead is transparency about the inputs and discipline about the rules, which brings us to the covenant.

How often positions update

Positions update monthly. Alongside your position you see your movement: up 23 positions, down 12 positions. The arrow matters as much as the number, because it tells you whether what you are doing is working.

Rankings are rolling out category by category, so some categories show positions before others.

The rules we commit to

We will not tell you the formula, but we will tell you what it considers, and we never change the rules without telling you. Concretely:

• We publish what the algorithm considers (the list above).
• We never publish weights or thresholds.
• We announce rule changes before they take effect. If a new signal enters the algorithm or a weight shifts materially, creators hear about it first.
• We never retroactively penalize. If the rules change, old behavior is judged by old rules.

This is how trust works where we come from: the system is fair, the process is transparent, and the details are professionally managed.

How to improve your position

There is no trick, and that is the point. The five factors above are the honest guide: post consistently, grow a real audience, stay close to your category, and let your engagement come from people who actually care. Connecting your platforms keeps your data verified and current, and a complete profile makes sure you are ranked in the right category. Everything else is doing the work.