diff --git a/src/telemetry-tracing.ts b/src/telemetry-tracing.ts
index b921518ab..422b2d904 100644
--- a/src/telemetry-tracing.ts
+++ b/src/telemetry-tracing.ts
@@ -347,7 +347,7 @@ export class PubsubSpans {
 
     const spanAttributes = {
       // Add Opentelemetry semantic convention attributes to the span, based on:
-      // https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-specification/blob/v1.1.0/specification/trace/semantic_conventions/messaging.md
+      // https://github.com/open-telemetry/semantic-conventions/blob/v1.24.0/docs/messaging/messaging-spans.md
       ['messaging.system']: 'gcp_pubsub',
       ['messaging.destination.name']: destinationId ?? destinationName,
       ['gcp.project_id']: projectId,
@@ -396,6 +396,7 @@ export class PubsubSpans {
     });
     if (topicInfo.topicId) {
       span.updateName(`${topicInfo.topicId} create`);
+      span.setAttribute('messaging.operation', 'create');
       span.setAttribute('messaging.destination.name', topicInfo.topicId);
     }
 
@@ -430,6 +431,7 @@ export class PubsubSpans {
     const attributes = this.createAttributes(subInfo, message, caller);
     if (subInfo.subId) {
       attributes['messaging.destination.name'] = subInfo.subId;
+      attributes['messaging.operation'] = 'receive';
     }
 
     if (context) {
@@ -553,6 +555,7 @@ export class PubsubSpans {
     );
 
     span?.setAttribute('messaging.batch.message_count', messageSpans.length);
+    span?.setAttribute('messaging.operation', 'receive');
 
     if (span) {
       // Also attempt to link from the subscribe span(s) back to the publish RPC span.
@@ -600,6 +603,7 @@ export class PubsubSpans {
     );
 
     span?.setAttribute('messaging.batch.message_count', messageSpans.length);
+    span?.setAttribute('messaging.operation', 'receive');
 
     if (span) {
       // Also attempt to link from the subscribe span(s) back to the publish RPC span.
@@ -651,7 +655,7 @@ export class PubsubSpans {
   }
 
   static setReceiveProcessResult(span: Span, isAck: boolean) {
-    span.setAttribute('messaging.gcp_pubsub.result', isAck ? 'ack' : 'nack');
+    span?.setAttribute('messaging.gcp_pubsub.result', isAck ? 'ack' : 'nack');
   }
 }