You search for something on Google and, above the familiar ten blue links, you get a ready-made answer put together by AI. That block is called an AI Overview, and it is changing the search behavior of billions of people. For brands it raises one urgent question: how do I get into that answer, instead of below it? This article explains what Google AI Overviews are, how Google chooses which sources go into them, what they do to your traffic, and how you improve your odds.
What are Google AI Overviews?
Google AI Overviews are the AI-generated summaries that appear at the top of the search results, powered by a Gemini model that Google tuned specifically for Search. Instead of only showing links, Google answers the question directly with a short piece of text and cites a handful of sources alongside it. They started rolling out in May 2024 in the United States and then more widely.
The scale is enormous. Around its July 2025 earnings, Alphabet reported that AI Overviews reached roughly 2 billion monthly users. For the kind of queries where an AI Overview appears, Google says they drive more than 10% additional searches: people search more because they get an answer faster. For brands that means a growing share of your audience sees an AI answer first, and only then, maybe, your link.
It is important not to confuse AI Overviews with the standalone AI chatbots. For how you get into ChatGPT answers, read ChatGPT SEO; this article is specifically about Google's AI Overviews in the search results.
AI Overviews vs AI Mode: what is the difference?
AI Overviews and AI Mode are two different things that both run on Gemini. An AI Overview is the automatic summary block at the top of a regular search results page. AI Mode is a separate, conversational search experience where you ask follow-up questions, more like a chatbot.
AI Mode counted more than 100 million monthly users in the United States and India by July 2025. For most brands the AI Overview matters most for now, because it appears in the regular search results where your audience already searches.
How does Google choose which sources go into an AI Overview?
Google gathers the sources for an AI Overview with a technique it calls query fan-out: instead of answering a single query, it sends out several related queries at once across subtopics and sources, and assembles an answer from them. So your content does not compete for one search term, but to be mentioned in a composed answer to a whole cluster of questions.
Your organic ranking plays a part, but less decisively than you might think. Research by Ahrefs (July 2025) covering a million keywords found a positive but moderate link between ranking and citation in an AI Overview: even for the page in position 1, getting cited is more a coin toss than a certainty. At the same time, according to a second Ahrefs analysis, roughly 76% of cited pages do come from the top 10. The takeaway: a strong organic position increases your odds considerably, but guarantees no spot in the AI answer.
Veesie measures the AI visibility of your brand across ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity for marketers and agencies, so you can see where you stand in the wider AI landscape.
What do AI Overviews do to your traffic?
AI Overviews push down click-through to websites, because the answer often already sits above the links. The Pew Research Center (March 2025) found that users click on a regular search result in only 8% of cases when an AI summary appears, against 15% without one. A source within the summary was clicked in just 1% of visits. This is one market's data and therefore indicative rather than definitive, but the direction lines up with other research.
That other research is sharper. Ahrefs measured that the presence of an AI Overview correlates with a 34.5% lower click-through rate for the top-ranking result (data from March 2025), and in a follow-up measurement with data from December 2025 that drop had risen to roughly 58%. This is a correlation, not a proven cause, but the pattern is consistent: if an AI Overview sits above your result, it costs you clicks. Whoever is inside the answer stays visible; whoever is below it loses traffic.
How do you get into Google AI Overviews?
You get into AI Overviews with the same foundation as the rest of GEO: citation-worthy content on an accessible, authoritative site. Three things count the most.
- Write citation-worthy content. The Princeton GEO study (KDD 2024) showed that enriching content with numbers, sources and quotes can lift visibility in AI answers by up to 40%. Open every section with a direct, factual answer to the question in the heading, because that is what an AI model can lift out.
- Keep your organic SEO strong. Because most cited pages come from the top 10, classic ranking remains your entry ticket. Accessibility, structure and authority all weigh in. You can read the technical foundation in the AI Readiness score and the GEO audit checklist.
- Do not waste time on schema as a silver bullet. A difference-in-differences study by Ahrefs (2026) found that adding JSON-LD schema produces no meaningful rise in AI citations. Schema stays useful for classic rich results, but not as a lever for AI Overviews.
Google itself does not see AI as a replacement for search, but as an extension. Liz Reid, head of Google Search, sums it up this way:
We don't see AI as a replacement for search. We see it as a complement, as something that lets us reinvent search.
Liz Reid, head of Google Search, in Search Engine Land (September 2025)
The full roadmap is in what generative engine optimization is and the concrete actions in 8 tips to improve your GEO Score. Veesie tracks weekly, for marketers and agencies, whether their brand is cited in AI answers. Create a free account and your first measurement is ready in less than five minutes.
How does this fit into your wider AI visibility?
Google AI Overviews are one front in a wider fight for AI visibility. Alongside Google, the standalone chatbots ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity also cite brands in their answers, and each does so in its own way, as you can read in how to appear in AI chatbots. Your position in an AI Overview says little about your visibility in ChatGPT, and the other way around. That is why you track both as separate signals within one strategy.
Veesie gives marketers and agencies a GEO Score that shows how often AI models name their brand, measured across four AI models. For your position in Google AI Overviews specifically, you steer on your organic ranking and the citation-worthiness principles from this article; for the chatbots you measure it directly. How you set that up is in the KPI guide: how to measure AI visibility, and the difference from classic SEO is in GEO vs SEO.
Conclusion: the answer now sits at the top
Google AI Overviews shift the search results page from a list of links to a ready-made answer with a few sources. This is not a temporary experiment: with 2 billion monthly users and a measurable drop in click-through, it is the new shape of Google search. Your position below it is worth less, your mention inside it ever more important.
The brands that appear in AI Overviews are the brands with citation-worthy content, a technically healthy site and strong authority, exactly the signals that count in the chatbots too. So do not start with a separate AI Overviews tactic, but with a healthy GEO foundation and a baseline measurement of where you stand today. Veesie makes that AI visibility concrete for marketers and agencies, measuring how often your brand is cited across ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity, so you steer on data instead of gut feeling. Still unsure about the approach? Compare the pricing and features first.