Remember when getting to the top of Google was the whole game? It still matters, but there's now something sitting above the top spot: an AI-written answer. And it's changing how people behave.

What the research says

Pew Research Center tracked the real browsing of US adults and found that when a Google AI summary appeared, people clicked on a normal search result in just 8% of visits, compared with 15% when there was no summary. Links inside the summary itself were clicked in only about 1% of visits.

58% fewer clicks go to the number one Google result when an AI Overview appears above it.

Source: Ahrefs, 300,000-keyword study, Feb 2026

Ahrefs looked at 300,000 keywords and found that an AI Overview correlates with 58% fewer clicks to the top-ranking page. And this isn't just an American thing: Ofcom says around 30% of UK searches now show an AI overview, and 53% of UK adults say they often see them.

Add in ChatGPT's 800 million weekly users and Google's 2 billion-plus monthly AI Overview users, and the conclusion is simple: a growing share of your customers will meet an AI answer before they meet your website.

So what do you do about it?

The good news is that you don't need a secret trick. Google itself says there are no special requirements for appearing in its AI features: the usual SEO fundamentals apply. Here's what that looks like in practice:

  1. Answer real questions, clearly. Write pages that answer what customers actually ask, in plain English. AI quotes clarity.
  2. Make your site readable by machines. Allow crawling, keep it fast, use structured data that matches your content.
  3. Get talked about. Reviews, local press, directories and social posts are all evidence that you're trusted.
  4. Check what AI says about you. Ask the tools the questions your customers ask. If you're not mentioned, you've found your starting point.

The boffin bottom line

If you're not in the answer, you're not in the running. The fix isn't magic; it's doing the fundamentals consistently, and making sure the internet has plenty of good things to say about you. That's exactly what our AI visibility service does.

Want to know how your business shows up on social, Google and AI? Get a free AI visibility check →

Sources

  1. Pew Research Center, July 2025 (US adults, March 2025 browsing data): https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/07/22/google-users-are-less-likely-to-click-on-links-when-an-ai-summary-appears-in-the-results/
  2. Ahrefs, 300,000-keyword study, Feb 2026: https://ahrefs.com/blog/ai-overviews-reduce-clicks-update/
  3. Ofcom, Online Nation 2025 (Dec 2025): https://www.ofcom.org.uk/media-use-and-attitudes/online-habits/from-apps-to-ai-search-how-the-uk-goes-online-in-2025
  4. Alphabet Q2 2025 earnings call, reported by TechCrunch (Jul 2025): https://techcrunch.com/2025/07/23/googles-ai-overviews-have-2b-monthly-users-ai-mode-100m-in-the-us-and-india
  5. OpenAI DevDay, Oct 2025, reported by TechCrunch: https://techcrunch.com/2025/10/06/sam-altman-says-chatgpt-has-hit-800m-weekly-active-users/
  6. Google Search Central, AI features and your website: https://developers.google.com/search/docs/appearance/ai-features