In mid-October 2026 Google announced a set of changes to AI Mode and to AI Overviews, the summaries an AI model writes at the top of the search page. According to the post on Google's official blog, the goal is to make it easier for someone reading one of those answers to continue on to websites, news outlets and creators.
The announcement follows two years of complaints from site owners who watched their Google traffic fall once the automatic answers started appearing above the results. Google points to a different figure: the number of people using Preferred Sources, a feature that lets you pick news sites to be given priority, has grown more than 7x since the start of the year.
Five changes, two of them still tests
The first concerns links embedded in the text of an answer, on a word or a phrase. Google says it has already increased their number substantially, and they will now appear higher in the answer and more often.
The second is still being tested. When there are only one or two places on the web to complete a specific task or find an exact piece of information, they will get their own section at the top of the answer, with a short line explaining why each link is useful. Google describes this as an extension of what it already does when someone is clearly looking for a particular site.
Carousels of articles on timely topics are coming to more countries and languages, and will highlight each user's preferred sources. Google did not say which countries. The links shown at the end of some answers are also getting image thumbnails and a more prominent design.
The last change is a test that started the same week in AI Mode. On video results, the creator or publisher name becomes clickable. The click leads to their Google Search profile, not straight to their website or channel.
Why Google would send people away
At first glance it is an odd move. Most of Google's revenue comes from ads on the results page, and every visitor who leaves it is one who won't click them. The likely explanation is a goal Google has set for itself: a single search page written entirely by AI.
Today the page has two parts, the automatic answer on top and the regular results below it. One reason Google hasn't dropped the lower part yet is that many searches are just a way to reach a specific site, and someone looking for a link doesn't want to read a paragraph. Prominent links at the top of the answer solve exactly that problem, removing one of the last obstacles to retiring the list of results.
Selling products versus selling page views
A site that earns directly from each visit, through ads or affiliate commissions, stands to lose the most from this shift and may have to change its business model. For most businesses the visit was only ever a means, and the money comes from sales. For them, a recommendation inside the AI answer can be worth more than first place in the list, because Google still shapes buying decisions.
A growing share of website visitors is expected to be AI agents browsing on a user's behalf rather than people. It is worth checking now that those agents can find your site and complete actions on it.
For now there is no way to know how much traffic the new links actually send. Google's announcement includes no click figures.