By Aijaz Alam
How much do AI Overviews reduce clicks?
Clicks roughly halve. In Pew Research Center's March 2025 browsing data from 900 US adults, people clicked a normal Google result on 8% of visits with an AI Overview, against 15% without one. Ahrefs found a 58% lower desktop click rate for the top-ranking page in December 2025. Links inside the summary got clicks on 1% of visits.
- 8%US Google visits with an AI summary that led to a click on a normal result, against 15% withoutPew Research Center, Mar 2025
- -58%Desktop click rate of the top-ranking page when an AI Overview showsAhrefs, Dec 2025 vs Dec 2023
- 1%Visits with an AI summary that included a click on a link inside itPew Research Center, Mar 2025
- 26%Results pages with an AI summary that ended the browsing session, against 16% withoutPew Research Center, Mar 2025
- Over 10%More Google queries for the types of searches that show AI OverviewsAlphabet, Q2 2025
The numbers
The full breakdown
What US Google users did, with and without an AI summary (Mar 2025)
| Behaviour on the Google results page | With an AI summary | Without an AI summary |
|---|---|---|
| Clicked a traditional search result | 8% | 15% |
| Clicked a link inside the AI summary | 1% | n/a |
| Ended the browsing session | 26% | 16% |
Pew Research Center: tracked browsing of 900 US adults, 68,879 Google searches, 1-31 March 2025. Shares of visits to results pages.
Google searches that produced an AI summary, by type of search (Mar 2025)
| Type of search | Searches with an AI summary |
|---|---|
| Starting with who, what, when or why | 60% |
| 10 words or more | 53% |
| Full sentence (with a noun and a verb) | 36% |
| All searches | 18% |
| One or two words | 8% |
Pew re-ran the 68,879 searches on 7-17 April 2025; 12,593 produced an AI summary. Wikipedia, YouTube and Reddit made up 15% of the sources cited in summaries and 17% of standard results.
Ahrefs: position 1 desktop click rate, with and without an AI Overview
| Ahrefs study | Keywords with an AI Overview | Informational keywords without one | Forecast for AI Overview keywords without it | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apr 2025 study: Mar 2024 to Mar 2025 | 7.3% to 2.6% | 5.6% to 3.1% | 4.0% | -34.5% |
| Feb 2026 update: Dec 2023 to Dec 2025 | 7.3% to 1.6% | 7.6% to 3.9% | 3.7% | -58% |
Vendor studies: 300,000 keywords from Ahrefs Keywords Explorer (150,000 with an AI Overview, 150,000 informational without), desktop click rate from aggregated Google Search Console data. The update spans two years, not one, so -34.5% to -58% is not a clean trend. Ahrefs gives click rates as decimals (0.073); shown here as percent. The -34.5% is Ahrefs' own figure; the rounded rates shown give about -35%.
Change in desktop click rate when an AI Overview shows, by ranking position (Dec 2025)
| Ranking position | Change in click rate |
|---|---|
| 1 | -58.0% |
| 2 | -50.8% |
| 3 | -46.4% |
| 4 | -38.8% |
| 5 | -32.6% |
| 6 | -30.5% |
| 7 | -29.7% |
| 8 | -28.8% |
| 9 | -29.7% |
| 10 | -19.4% |
Ahrefs, February 2026 update, December 2025 against a forecast from December 2023.
What Google says about AI Overviews and clicks
| Google's statement | Figure | When |
|---|---|---|
| More queries for the types of searches that show AI Overviews, worldwide | Over 10% | Q2 2025 (Alphabet earnings remarks, Jul 2025) |
| Total organic click volume from Google Search to websites, year over year | Relatively stable (no figure given) | Aug 2025 (Liz Reid, head of Google Search) |
Company statements, not audited. Google also says average click quality has increased, meaning fewer quick returns to the results page, without publishing numbers.
Why sources differ
Same question, different answers
| Number | When | Who measured | Why it differs |
|---|---|---|---|
| -58% | Dec 2025 | Ahrefs | Desktop click rate of the top-ranking page across 300,000 keywords, against a forecast; not a share of visits. |
| -34.5% | Mar 2025 | Ahrefs | Same method over one year (Mar 2024 to Mar 2025); the update compares two years. |
| Relatively stable | Aug 2025 | Total organic clicks to websites from all searches, year over year; no figure published. | |
| Over 10% | Q2 2025 | Alphabet | Counts extra queries, not clicks, for the types of searches that show AI Overviews. |
Every independent study finds fewer clicks when an AI Overview appears, but the size of the drop depends on what is measured.
Pew measures people. It tracked the real browsing of 900 US adults for a month and counted how often a visit to a Google results page led to a click. Its 15% to 8% is a fall of about half, across all kinds of results.
Ahrefs measures keywords. It compares the desktop click rate of the number one result on keywords with and without an AI Overview, using Search Console data, and forecasts what the rate would have been without one. Its -34.5% covered one year; its -58% covers two, and the gap grows for higher positions. These are vendor studies and cover desktop only.
Google measures its whole platform. It says total organic clicks to websites have been relatively stable and that AI Overviews bring over 10% more queries for the searches that show them. Both can be true alongside Pew and Ahrefs: more searches can offset fewer clicks per search in the total, while pages that answer simple questions still lose clicks.
What it means
How to use these numbers
If your page answers a question that Google can summarise, expect fewer clicks from that search. In Pew's data, visits with an AI summary led to a click on a normal result about half as often, and Ahrefs puts the loss for the top result at more than half on desktop.
The pages most at risk are the ones that answer questions. 60% of searches starting with who, what, when or why produced a summary, against 8% of one- or two-word searches. Being cited inside the summary is not a substitute: links in summaries were clicked on 1% of visits.
The loss is not the same everywhere. Lower positions lose less (-19.4% at position 10 against -58% at position 1), and searches with no summary are not affected.
For site owners, check your own Search Console for question-style queries, compare click rates before and after AI Overviews appeared, and give readers a reason to visit that a summary cannot: tools, data, prices and local details.
Method and sources
How it was measured
Method
- Pew Research Center
- Tracked browsing of 900 US adults on Ipsos KnowledgePanel Digital, 1-31 March 2025; 68,879 Google searches re-run 7-17 April 2025; Google only
- Ahrefs, Apr 2025
- 300,000 keywords, desktop click rate from aggregated Google Search Console data, March 2024 vs March 2025; published 17 Apr 2025
- Ahrefs, Feb 2026
- Same design, December 2023 vs December 2025; published 4 Feb 2026
- Alphabet Q2 2025 earnings remarks (23 Jul 2025) and Liz Reid's post of 6 Aug 2025; company statements
- Checked at source
- 23 Oct 2026 (repo stats); 31 Oct 2026, the Pew short read, both Ahrefs studies and the Google post of 6 Aug 2025
- Last changed
- 30 Oct 2026
- Data files
- CSV · JSON (stable links)
Sources
- Pew Research Center Survey
- AI Overviews click-through studies, Ahrefs Vendor data
- Google and Alphabet official announcements (I/O keynote, earnings call remarks), Google / Alphabet Vendor data
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FAQ
More questions people ask
Which searches are most likely to show an AI Overview?
Question searches: 60% of Google searches starting with who, what, when or why produced an AI summary in Pew's March 2025 data, and 53% of searches of 10 words or more, against 8% of one- or two-word searches.
Do lower-ranked results lose clicks too?
Yes, but less. Ahrefs found the desktop click rate fell 58% at position 1, 46.4% at position 3 and 19.4% at position 10 when an AI Overview showed (December 2025).
Does Google agree that AI Overviews cut clicks?
No. Google's head of Search wrote in August 2025 that total organic click volume to websites was relatively stable year over year and that click quality had risen, but published no figures.
Do people click the links inside AI Overviews?
Rarely: on 1% of visits to Google results pages with an AI summary, per Pew's March 2025 browsing data.
Every number on this page was checked at its original source (Pew Research Center, Ahrefs, Google / Alphabet). Free to cite with a link to this page.