Peec AI data shows external links in AI Overviews climbing to 26%
Peec AI published a chart on September 21 showing that the share of Google AI Overviews containing an external link inside the answer text rose from near zero in late August to 26.2% on September 20. The daily average covers August 25 to September 20, with the sharp increase beginning around September 11.
Malte Landwehr of Peec AI wrote that Google had massively increased the number of external links within AI Overview answers. Asked whether the query set stayed the same over the period, he said any prompt changes were a small percentage. The chart does not state how many queries or AI Overviews were sampled, which markets or devices were covered, or how Peec distinguishes an inline link from a citation card or an end-of-response suggestion.
The same day, Gagan Ghotra posted an 18-second recording of himself clicking underlined text inside an AI Overview and being taken to an AI Mode conversation rather than a website. He described the anchor links as a test and as another tactic to push users from search results into AI Mode. The recording shows one search and does not indicate how widely the element appears.
Google's Search Console rules turn on where a click lands. A click on an external page inside an AI Overview counts as a click, while a link that runs a new Google query counts as neither a click nor an impression. For brands tracking citations, the two link types look similar in an answer but register very differently in measurement.
Reported by Search Engine Journal ↗
Topics: AI Overviews, AI Mode, Measurement
In this directory: Peec AI