AI Overviews are appearing for more search terms. And that might mean your website gets less traffic than it did before AI Overviews were released.
This guide shows you how to
- Diagnose whether AI Overviews are actually hurting your traffic
- Identify which pages are affected
- Decide what to do next
You'll learn how to adapt your content strategy, protect your most valuable pages, and find new opportunities where AI Overviews haven't taken over yet.
Are AI Overviews the Reason My Website Has Lost Traffic?
AI Overviews may be the reason your website has lost traffic if they now appear for keywords that previously sent clicks to your site, but our research suggests that AI Overviews don’t automatically reduce clicks.
In analyzing over 200,000 keywords, we found that when comparing the same keywords before and after they started showing AI Overviews, zero-click rates decreased slightly from 38.1% to 36.2%.
Meaning that the presence of an AI Overview for a keyword doesn’t necessarily mean your site will stop getting traffic.
Declines in website traffic can also be caused by:
- Algorithm updates
- Technical site errors
- Seasonal patterns
- Other SERP features like featured snippets
Understanding the real reason behind why your site has lost traffic helps you assess and fix the problem.
I’ll give you detailed steps for checking each area in the following sections.
How Do I Check If My Important Keywords Now Show AI Overviews?
To check if your important keywords now show AI Overviews, manually search your top 20-50 keywords and look for the expandable AI-generated summary at the top of results.
To do this quickly across many keywords, use tools like Semrush's Keyword Overview to track which queries trigger AI Overviews and monitor changes over time.
Enter up to 100 keywords, click “Search,” and review the “SERP Features” column to find keywords with the AI Overview icon. This approach scales better than manual checking when you're tracking hundreds of keywords.
How Can I Tell If My Traffic Drop Started When AI Overviews Rolled Out?
To tell if your traffic drop started when AI Overviews rolled out, review your site’s analytics traffic data from May 2024 (the time when Google began testing AI Overviews) and onward.
Look for traffic declines that coincide with these dates.
If your traffic dropped gradually over months or started before AI Overview availability in your region, other factors (like weak SEO) are more likely responsible.
How Much Traffic Do Websites Typically Lose When AI Overviews Appear?
The amount of traffic websites lose when AI Overviews appear varies based on the type of query and whether the query sufficiently answers the searcher’s question.
Keywords that trigger AI Overviews show higher zero-click rates on average compared to keywords without them. That’s likely because these queries are primarily informational and users can find answers directly in the summary.
What Other Common Causes of Traffic Drops Should I Check Before I Blame AI Overviews?
Other common causes of traffic drops you should check before blaming AI Overviews include Google algorithm updates, site penalties, ranking position losses, seasonal traffic patterns, and technical SEO issues.
- Review Google's Search Status Dashboard and Semrush Sensor for algorithm updates that match your traffic drop timing. Algorithm updates can trigger sitewide ranking changes that dwarf any AI Overview impact.
- Check your Manual Actions in Google Search Console to see if your site has any penalties impacting your rankings
- Compare your ranking positions before and after the drop using Position Tracking. If you've fallen from position three to position eight for key terms, that explains the traffic loss regardless of AI Overviews.
- Compare this year's traffic to the same period last year to identify whether your drop is actually just a seasonal change in traffic
- Run a Site Audit to detect crawl errors, indexing blocks, or Core Web Vitals problems that appeared recently and may impact your site
What Do AI Overviews Actually Change in Google Search?
AI Overviews change Google Search by placing AI-generated summaries at the top of results pages, which shifts user attention upward and reduces the visibility of traditional organic listings below.
These summaries synthesize information from multiple sources into a single answer block that appears above the organic results.
Unlike featured snippets that extract text from one page, AI Overviews combine insights from several sites to create a new, unified response. Users can often get their answer without scrolling past the overview.
What Do AI Overviews Look Like on the Results Page?
AI Overviews look like expandable summary boxes at the top of search results, typically with a colored AI badge, a multi-paragraph answer, and linked source citations within and beside the text.
The overview appears above all organic results and usually starts in a collapsed or partially collapsed state.
When you click to expand it, you see a longer AI-generated summary that synthesizes information from multiple sources. Each key point or fact often includes a small numbered citation that links to the source website.
How Do AI Overviews Change Where People Look and Click?
AI Overviews change where people look and click by drawing user attention to the top of the page, which reduces the visibility of—and clicks to—organic results positioned below the overview.
Users naturally scan from top to bottom, and AI Overviews occupy the most valuable screen real estate.
When users find a satisfactory answer in the overview, they often stop scrolling entirely. Even when they do scroll past the overview, organic results that previously appeared "above the fold" (the content that’s visible without scrolling) now require scrolling to see.
This creates a new click distribution pattern where sites cited within the AI Overview can capture clicks from the source cards displayed at the bottom of the summary.
The shift is most dramatic on mobile devices, where AI Overviews can occupy the entire first screen.
Despite AI Overviews taking up more screen space on mobile, our research shows that zero-click searches are actually lower on mobile than on desktop: 17.3% on mobile versus 25.6% on desktop.
Which Kinds of Searches Are Most Likely to Lose Clicks to AI Overviews?
Informational searches are most likely to lose clicks to AI Overviews—especially simple definitional queries, comparisons, and factual questions that can be answered comprehensively in a few paragraphs (like “what are hors d'oeuvres?”)
According to our analysis of 10M+ keywords, 88.1% of queries that trigger AI Overviews are informational.
Searches with commercial, transactional, or navigational search intent (the reason behind a search) are currently safer. Commercial queries represent only 8.69% of AI Overview triggers, transactional queries 1.76%, and navigational queries 1.43%. For example, "best protein powder" (commercial intent) typically doesn't trigger an AI Overview, while "what is BMR" (informational intent) does.
How Do I See Which Parts of My Site Are Affected?
You can see which pages of your site were affected by AI Overviews by looking at traffic before and after the rollout of AI Overviews.
Google began testing AI Overviews in the U.S. in May 2024, so that’s a good time period to look at.
Start by reviewing your site's overall traffic, and then digging into specific pages. Start with your most important pages (pages that drive significant traffic or conversions). See whether traffic began to decline around the time that Google released AI Overviews.
How Can I Use Search Console to Spot Pages That Lost Clicks Around the Time AI Overviews Appeared?
You can’t use Google Search Console to spot pages that lost clicks around the time AI Overviews appeared because AI Overviews appeared around May 2024 in the United States, and Google Search Console data only goes back 16 months.
Instead, you should use your site’s analytics (like Google Analytics) to review potential traffic loss from May 2024 and onward.
How Do I Find Queries Where I Still Rank but Now Sit Under an AI Overview?
To find queries where you still rank but now sit under an AI Overview, you need to use a keyword tracking tool that tracks which keywords AI Overviews appear for.
One tool you can use is Semrush’s Organic Research. Enter your website’s domain and click “Search.” Head into the “Positions” tab. Use the drop-down to select “SERP Features on SERP” and “AI Overview.”
You’ll get a list of all the keywords your site ranks for that have AI Overviews.
Which Affected Pages Should I Focus on Fixing or Protecting First?
Focus on fixing or protecting pages closer to the bottom of the funnel where users still click despite AI Overviews because they need to compare options, see pricing, or complete a purchase.
You should also prioritize:
- Branded content: Industry definition queries, trending topics in your niche, or questions where you can showcase a unique methodology to build thought leadership
- Quick-win SERP opportunities: Keywords with weak or missing featured snippets, untapped AI Overview results, or long-tail keywords that can’t be directly and concisely answered
Avoid prioritizing top-of-funnel definitional content ("what is X") where AI Overviews fully satisfy user intent and generate zero clicks. Instead, consider focusing on commercial and transactional keywords that sit near the bottom of the funnel.
You can quickly check a keyword’s intent with a tool like Semrush’s Keyword Overview. The “Intent” column tells you whether the keyword is informational, navigational, commercial, or transactional.
Is It Worth Trying to Appear in AI Overviews?
Yes, it is worth trying to appear in AI Overviews when your goals include brand visibility and authority building, not just direct traffic, since AI Overviews send relatively few clicks.
Being cited in an AI Overview keeps your brand visible at the top of search results even as click-through rates decline. Users who see your site referenced in the summary may search for your brand directly later, creating indirect traffic value that doesn't show up in immediate click metrics.
And tools like Semrush’s Visibility Overview make it easy to track your brand’s visibility within AI Overviews (and other LLMs).
How Many Clicks Do AI Overviews Usually Send to Websites?
AI Overviews usually send very few direct clicks to websites from the source citations displayed below the summary, with Pew Research Center finding that only 1% of searchers who encounter an AI summary click through to a website listed.
However, indirect value exists beyond direct clicks, and showing up in AI Overviews can still help your brand reach your audience.
How Can Showing Up in AI Overviews Help My Brand if Clicks Are Low?
Showing up in AI Overviews helps your brand by establishing authority and maintaining top-of-search visibility, which builds trust and can trigger branded searches later even when direct clicks are minimal.
When users see your brand cited in an AI Overview, you gain credibility as a trusted source on that topic. This brand exposure matters even without immediate clicks as users might remember which brands Google's AI references and then search for your site directly when they need more details or are ready to buy.
Being included in AI Overviews also prevents competitors from gaining mindshare (the attention, recognition, and top-of-mind awareness a brand holds with their audience).
When Should I Focus on Brand Presence Instead of Traffic for These Queries?
You should focus on brand presence instead of traffic for these queries when AI Overviews fully answer top-of-funnel informational questions, but the topic is central to your industry expertise and competitors are being cited.
Prioritize brand presence when:
- The query defines your industry or core offering (e.g., "what is content marketing" for a content marketing platform)
- Competitors appear in the AI Overview and you don't, creating an authority gap
- The query has high search volume despite low clicks, giving you repeated brand exposure
- Users researching this topic will eventually need your product or service
Skip brand presence efforts for tangential topics unrelated to your core business or queries where neither you nor competitors can realistically get cited.
What Can I Do If AI Overviews Are Already Taking Traffic from My Site?
If AI Overviews are already taking traffic from your site, optimize content to increase your chances of being cited in the overview, adjust your strategy to capture clicks that AI summaries don't fully satisfy, and shift focus away from zero-click queries.
Start by making your content more citation-worthy through clear structure, authoritative sources, and concise answers that AI models can easily extract.
For queries where users still need more than a summary, provide value beyond what the overview offers—detailed examples, tools, templates, or comparison tables that require a click to access.
But when AI Overviews completely satisfy user intent and clicks drop to near zero, reallocate your resources to lower-funnel keywords where commercial intent keeps users clicking despite AI summaries.
SEO expert Connor Gillivan notes that he uses a similar approach for his clients:
How Can I Make My Content More Likely to Be Used in an AI Overview?
To make your content more likely to be used in an AI Overview, structure it with clear headings that mirror common questions, answer each question directly in the first sentence, and support claims with authoritative sources.
Here’s an example of how we use clear headings with the answer in the following text:
You should also:
- Write sections so each paragraph stands alone without requiring context from earlier text
- Add credibility signals like author bylines with credentials, links to authoritative sources, recent publication dates, and data from recognized institutions
- Keep sentences short and direct so LLMs can easily understand them. Write "Keyword research is the process of finding search terms your audience uses" instead of "Keyword research, which helps inform your content strategy, is the process that many marketers use to find terms their audience uses."
Use a tool like Semrush's SEO Writing Assistant to check readability and optimize structure as you write content.
How Should I Adjust My Content So Users Still Want to Click Through After Reading the Summary?
To adjust your content so users still want to click through after reading the summary, provide value that AI Overviews can't deliver like interactive tools, detailed examples, downloadable templates, comparison tables, or step-by-step tutorials.
Doing this positions your page as the next logical step and increases the click-through rate to your website. For example, the AI Overview for “how to calculate bmi” features calculators that users can click to if they want a fast way to calculate their BMI.
When Should I Stop Chasing a Query That Has Become Mostly Zero-Click?
Stop chasing a query that has become mostly zero-click when it shows no commercial intent, the AI Overview fully satisfies user needs, and the traffic you're losing doesn't lead to conversions or meaningful engagement.
Redirect your resources to queries where AI Overviews don't satisfy complete user intent—comparison content, detailed how-tos, or bottom-funnel commercial queries where users need to evaluate options before purchasing.
What Simple Plan Can I Follow Over the Next 90 Days to Adapt to AI Overviews?
A simple plan you can follow over the next 90 days to adapt to AI Overviews includes spending the first month diagnosing impact, the second month optimizing high-value content, and the third month shifting strategy toward bottom-funnel keywords.
Here’s a full 90-day plan to adapt to AI Overviews:
- Days 1-30: Diagnose and Prioritize: Identify which pages lost traffic when AI Overviews appeared using website analytics, check which of your ranking keywords now trigger AI Overviews using Semrush’s Keyword Overview, and create a priority list of pages by traffic value and query intent
- Days 31-60: Optimize Citation-Worthy Content: Restructure top-priority pages with clear question-based headings and direct answers, add credibility signals (author credentials, authoritative sources, and recent dates), and use SEO Writing Assistant to improve readability and structure
- Days 61-90: Shift to Bottom-Funnel Keywords: Use Keyword Magic Tool to find commercial-intent keywords not yet triggering AI Overviews, create comparison content, detailed how-tos, and tools that provide value beyond AI summaries, and monitor which keywords you appear for in AI Overviews using Position Tracking
Grow Your Brand in the AI-Overview Era with Semrush
AI Overviews don't signal the end of your website—they represent a shift in how you build visibility, with new opportunities to grow brand awareness while focusing content efforts on keywords that actually drive conversions.
Semrush gives you the tools to navigate this transition with confidence. Sign up for a free trial to track AI Overviews and find keywords worth pursuing.
