In 2024, Google began adding AI-generated summaries to the top of its search results page. Online publishers have since reported drops in website traffic, saying the summaries are replacing traditional search results by allowing users to rely on AI responses instead of visiting individual websites.
A recent Pew Research Center report analyzed the browsing activity of 900 adults in the US. Of them, 58% received an AI-generated Google summary while using the search engine. When they did, participants were almost half as likely to click on links to other websites; only 8% did, compared to 15% users who clicked through linked results when an AI summary did not appear. Even the links shown within the AI summaries themselves got very few clicks, with just 1% of such results leading to a source being opened.
Searches written as questions, those using longer phrases, and searches in full sentences were more likely to have AI summaries. Only 8% of brief queries (one or two words) had AI summaries, but that figure rose to 53% when the search included 10 words or more. In total, about 18% of all searches in the study had an AI-generated result.
Pew’s study demonstrates that Google’s AI overviews are lowering the chances that users will click on links to external websites, like the one you’re on right now. Wikipedia editors’ worst fears have come true.