RANK LOCAL DATA

39 AI Overview Statistics for 2026

Updated November 2026

AI Overviews now show on 61.43% of Google searches, up from 5.93% two years ago. When one shows, the AI answer's citations take an estimated 42–45% of the clicks, and the #1 organic result's share drops to 21–24%.

Every number on this page comes from one study: DataForSEO's Search Insider 2026, which looked at 190 million+ keywords, 165 million+ AI answers and 1.1 billion+ backlinks in US Google and ChatGPT data. Each number is linked to the report and dated. Where the report says a result is a correlation and not a cause, so do we.

This page is part of our data section. For local-search numbers from other studies, see AI search and local business statistics and local search statistics.

Key Takeaways

How often do AI Overviews show on Google?

On most searches now. In two years the AI Overview went from a rare box to the most common feature on a Google results page.

AI Overviews went from 5.93% of Google searches in September 2024 to 61.43% in August 2026; local packs rose from 19.98% to 25.99%, videos from 9.67% to 19.98%, featured snippets fell from 8.96% to 0.44% Figure 1: AI Overviews went from 6% to 61% of Google searches in two years, while the local map pack held its ground. Source: DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026 (US Google, monthly panel, Sep 2024 to Aug 2026). Graphic by Rank Local from that source.

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How fast did AI Overviews grow?

What happened to the rest of the results page?

Which searches trigger an AI Overview?

All kinds, and the share is climbing in every group. Commercial searches, where people compare before they buy, grew fastest.

AI Overview trigger rate by search intent, Q4 2025 to Q3 2026: informational 48.42% to 70.44%, commercial 26.30% to 51.35%, navigational 17.04% to 34.03%, transactional 10.82% to 28.64% Figure 2: AI Overviews are moving into buying searches. Source: DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026 (US Google quarterly panel; Q3 2026 covers Jul 1 to Sep 14). Graphic by Rank Local from that source.

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By search intent

By search volume, difficulty and cost per click

  • Keywords with 201–300 monthly searches showed an AI Overview 58.59% of the time in Q3 2026, up from 33.10%. Keywords with 601+ searches had the lowest rate, 48.62% (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).
  • Mid-difficulty keywords (KD 21–60) showed AI Overviews about 65% of the time, easy keywords (KD 1–20) 60.64%, and the hardest (KD 81–100) 53.76% (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).
  • Keywords costing $5+ per click showed AI Overviews 49.55% of the time, almost the same as the cheapest keywords ($0–$0.25) at 50.54%. Keywords at $0.51–$1.00 had the lowest rate, 42.63% (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).

By industry

What happens to clicks when an AI Overview shows?

The clicks move to the AI answer. Its citations take 42–45% of estimated clicks no matter what kind of search it is, and every organic position on page one loses share.

Estimated click share of the #1 Google result without and with an AI Overview: informational 37% to 21%, commercial 34% to 21%, transactional 38% to 21%, navigational 33% to 24%; AI Overview citations take 42% to 45% Figure 3: Where clicks go when an AI Overview shows, by type of search. Source: DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026 (clickstream estimates, US Google, zero-click searches excluded). Graphic by Rank Local from that source.

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How much click share does the #1 result lose?

Are clicks falling even without AI Overviews?

  • From September 2025 to August 2026, desktop click-through rate for position 1 fell from 17.83% to 7.43%, and for position 2 from 15.27% to 3.07% (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).
  • Mobile held up better: position 1 fell from 25.17% to 20.80%, and position 2 rose from 7.99% to 8.52% (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).
  • The report says this data does not show whether AI answers, layout changes or user behavior caused the drop (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).

Are people searching differently?

  • On desktop, searches of five or more words rose from 29.3% to 34.8% of unique queries between September 2025 and August 2026; on mobile, from 29.6% to 31.9% (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).

Which websites get cited in AI answers?

Google's AI Overviews lean on video and community sites. ChatGPT leans on reference sites and publishers. Ranking well in one doesn't mean showing up in the other.

Who gets cited most in Google AI Overviews?

  • YouTube was the most-cited site in AI Overviews with 51.9 million citations, more than twice Reddit's 25.1 million (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).
  • Facebook (20.4M), Wikipedia (19.9M) and Google (15.9M) completed the top five; six of the top ten were social, video or community sites (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).

Who gets cited most in ChatGPT?

  • Wikipedia led ChatGPT citations with 4.88 million citing answers, then Reddit (3.25M), Fandom (670K), Britannica (486K) and NIH (476K) (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).
  • YouTube ranked first in AI Overviews but 19th in ChatGPT; Facebook, Instagram and TikTok were in Google's top ten but not ChatGPT's top 30 (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).
  • 27.3% of ChatGPT answers cited no source, against 0.7% of Google AI Overview answers (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).

How much does Reddit show up?

Yes, as far as the data can say. Sites that rank higher and sites that get cited by AI tend to have more referring domains. The report is clear that this is a relationship, not proof that links cause it.

Sites ranking #1 have a median of 111 referring domains vs 85 for positions 4 to 10; sites cited in AI Overviews for the hardest keywords have a median of 1,571 vs 282 for the easiest; referring domains correlate more with AI citations than UGC links alone Figure 4: Links still sit behind rankings and AI citations. Source: DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026 (associations, not cause and effect). Graphic by Rank Local from that source.

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  • Sites ranking #1 had a median of 111 referring domains, against 85 for sites ranking 4 to 10, a 31% difference (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).
  • The middle half of #1-ranking sites had 68 to 240 referring domains; for positions 4 to 10 it was 61 to 158 (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).
  • At the page level the gap is smaller: a median of 95 referring domains for #1 pages against 84 for positions 4 to 10, a 13% difference (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).
  • Sites cited in AI Overviews for the hardest keywords (KD 81–100) had a median of 1,571 referring domains, against 282 for the easiest keywords (KD 1–20), a 5.6-fold difference (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).
  • Referring domains correlated with AI citations at 0.406 for Google AI Overviews and 0.377 for ChatGPT (Spearman), stronger than UGC links alone at 0.342 and 0.314 (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).
  • Among sites with 10,000+ UGC links, 37.6% had 501+ AI Overview citations, against 0.19% of sites with no UGC links (DataForSEO, Search Insider 2026, Oct 2026).

What does this mean for a local business?

This section is Rank Local's reading of the numbers above, not part of the study.

  • The map pack is still there. Local packs grew to 25.99% of searches while featured snippets nearly vanished, so a strong Google Business Profile still matters.
  • Buying searches now get AI answers too. With half of commercial searches showing an AI Overview, being named in the answer is now part of being found, not only ranking under it.
  • Home services see fewer AI Overviews than average. Home & Garden sat at 49.28% against 56.7% overall, which leaves more room for the map pack and organic results in those trades.
  • Links and mentions on other sites still count. Higher rankings and more AI citations both go with more referring domains, and Reddit, YouTube and directories are where AI answers often pull from.

Methodology and Sources

Every number on this page comes from DataForSEO's Search Insider 2026 report, published October 2026 and opened on 5 November 2026. DataForSEO sells SEO and AI search data; we cite it as the researcher. The report's search and AI-answer data cover the United States in English: 190.26M keywords with SERP snapshots (June 16 to September 10, 2026), a monthly SERP panel from September 2024 to August 2026, a quarterly panel restricted to keywords with 100+ monthly searches, 137.9M unique Google AI Overview answers, 27.46M unique ChatGPT answers and about 1.14B backlink URLs. Click shares are estimates from clickstream data with zero-click searches excluded. Where the report describes a correlation, we say so; it does not show that links or any other factor cause rankings or citations. The figures are Rank Local graphics built from the report's numbers; we did not reuse the report's charts. This page is reviewed monthly.

Sources

Glossary

  • AI Overview: the AI-written summary Google shows at the top of some search results.
  • Citation (in AI answers): a website the AI answer links to or names as its source.
  • Click-through rate (CTR): the share of people who see a result and click it.
  • Commercial search: a search made while comparing options before buying, such as "best AC repair company".
  • Keyword difficulty (KD): a 1–100 score for how hard it is to rank for a search.
  • Local pack (map pack): the box of businesses with a map that Google shows for local searches.
  • Referring domain: a separate website that links to yours.
  • UGC link: a link from user-generated content such as a forum post or comment, marked rel="ugc".

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