AI Overview Study for 8,000 Keywords in Google Search
Understanding how search engines display information is crucial in today's digital landscape. One of Google's latest developments is AI Overviews - AI-generated summaries providing quick, relevant information directly in search results. This feature changes how users interact with search engines and affects organic traffic to websites.
In this study, we examine the frequency, placement, and impact of AI Overviews in Google Search. We explore how these summaries affect visibility and traffic and the types of queries and domains most commonly featured. Our goal is to offer insights for adapting your SEO strategy to this major change in Google search.
We also consulted several SEO experts who analyzed this data and provided their insights, which are embedded throughout the text.
TLDR
The average AI Overview is 169 words and 912 pixels long.
Only 12.4% of the analyzed keywords display an AI Overview.
A Featured Snippet is showing on 17.6% of the analyzed keywords.
On average, AI Overviews appear alongside Featured Snippets in 7.4% of cases. For the Health niche, they show up together the most often (34.9% of queries).
AI Overviews contain 7.2 links on average when expanded.
33.4% of AI Overview links rank in that query's top 10 organic results.
46.5% of the URLs included in AI Overviews rank outside the top 50 organic results.
Five-word queries trigger an AI Overview most frequently.
Keywords from the Health and Safety niches are more likely to trigger AI Overviews.
No AI Overviews show up for brand related queries.
Navigational intent keywords are less likely to display AI Overviews.
Google Ads are displayed in 28.3% keywords that trigger AI Overviews.
From all the keywords that trigger AI Overviews, Ads at the top of the SERP appear for 8.7% of keywords. Ads at the bottom are displayed for 19.5% of these keywords.
Shopping Ads are almost never seen together with AI Overviews and when they are, they always appear below the AI Overview.
Want to jump straight to the in depth study results? Click here.
What is an AI Overview?
The AI Overview is a feature that appears in the Google search results, that provides a summarized and concise answer to a query. The information is usually sourced from various web pages and it is presented at the top of the search results page.
The goal of AI Overviews is to enhance the user experience by making search interactions more efficient and informative. This is usually achieved by delivering quick, precise information to users without requiring them to click through multiple links.
While this sounds a lot like Featured Snippets (another SERP feature that appears as the first result in some Google searches), there are some differences between the two, as we will discover later in this article.
In our study, we identified four types of components inside AI Overviews:
Simple Lists
Image Lists
Paragraphs of text
Hero Images
The appearance of these components varies depending on the specific intents and industries.
About 40% of the AI Overviews contain numbered or bullet lists (SGEListItem):
About 34% of the AI Overviews contain a different type of list, which has images instead of bullet points (SGEEntityListItem):
Around 24% contain a paragraph of text (SGEParagraphFeedback):
Only a few of the AI Overviews we found returned a hero image (SGEHeroImage) together with a paragraph of text. This hero image appeared in about 1.3% of the cases and it had a link to a different URL than the links found in the AI Overview below the text.
Objective of the Study
When searchers find the needed information directly in the AI Overview, there is no need for further clicks, changing the flow of traffic to websites. In short, organic search results may receive less traffic from Google when an AI Overview is displayed at the top.
To minimize this effect, Google includes citations in the AI Overview, linking to the websites where the information is sourced. However, these citations are not always visible and are often hidden behind a "Show more" button.
Additionally, the AI Overview takes up significant space at the top of the SERP, especially when expanded, which pushes organic results further down the page and reduces their visibility even more.
Based on all this information, this study aims to answer the following questions:
How common are AI Overviews?
Do AI Overviews affect the visibility of the first organic result?
Do AI Overviews appear together with other SERP features?
Will AI Overviews replace Featured Snippets?
How are Google Ads influenced by AI Overviews?
Which queries are more likely to trigger an AI Overview?
How many links from AI Overviews appear in the organic results?
Do you need to rank organically to appear in SGE results?
Which domains are featured in AI Overviews as sources?
Are AI Overviews appearing with the same frequency for different industries/niches?
Does keyword intent affect the appearance of AI Overviews?
How is this study different?
For this study, we had two main goals:
Show real data about AI Overviews exactly as people see it when searching
Show the evolution of AI Overviews in time
To accomplish this, we have chosen 8,000 keywords (500 keywords from 16 different industries) and grouped them into 4 intents (Informational, Navigational, Commercial and Transactional).
Many of the existing studies are based on data when AI Overviews (back then known as SGE results) were only visible if Search Labs was enabled in the Google account. That is before Google launched AI overviews in the United States officially on May 14th at Google I/O.
To show real data about AI Overviews, this study contains searches made from newly created Google accounts with the Search Labs option disabled. While this limits the number of AI Overviews shown, it is exactly what people see when searching, thus ignoring any Google experiments.
Google has made numerous changes to AI Overviews in the past year and is likely to make more changes in the future. This means that any study on the subject may become outdated quickly. To address this, we created a free tool that tracks the evolution of AI Overviews over time.
How does the AI Overview tool work?
The free tool updates the entire dataset of 8,000 keywords each week, for all 16 industries and 4 intents.
There are three ways of looking at the data:
Default
Industries
Intent
The Default grouping shows aggregate data for the entire dataset.
By selecting the Industries and Intent grouping, you can compare how AI Overviews behave for different Industries and Intents.
You can also filter the data by a certain industry or intent from the top right filters. This limits the entire dataset to only the keywords that belong to the selected industry or intent, respectively.
Most of the charts show the last update by default. To see the evolution in time you can click on History above each chart.
Methodology of the Study
As of July 2024, AI Overviews appear in Google search results only if the following conditions are true:
The searchers are logged into their Google account
The searches are made from a United States IP address
We wanted to show real data about AI Overviews, so we created fresh Google accounts that have the Search Labs option disabled by default, to ignore any Google experiments.
We then searched for all the keywords in google.com on the desktop from US IP addresses.
The AI Overview Study
Disclaimer
It is important to note that the findings presented in this research reflect Google’s AI Overviews as of July 2024. This information may change over time, as Google is continuously updated. Depending on when you're reading this, be sure to also look at the latest data we have on AI Overviews, published weekly in the free tool.
Additionally, the numbers are closely related to the keyword data set used in our study. Since AI Overviews primarily appear for informational keywords that answer searchers' questions, we designed our keyword data set to be diverse, containing keywords from various industries and intents, to mimic a more general search experience.
How common are AI Overviews?
Before May 14th, when Google launched AI overviews officially at Google I/O, while SGE was still an opt-in experiment in Google Search Labs, one study revealed that the AI Overviews appeared for 84% of queries.
Google later announced that they were (at least temporarily) scaling back AI Overviews while they put in place more safeguards to prevent inaccurate answers.
When we examined the 8,000 keywords on July 1st, we found AI Overviews in only 12% of SERPs.
There are three different ways in which AI Overviews are shown in SERPs:
Fully shown
Partially shown
Manually generated
The difference between them is in how they are generated and displayed.
The partially shown AI Overviews are collapsed by default and have a “Show more” button which expands the section to show all the information.
The fully shown ones show the entire content of the AI Overview expanded by default.
The manually generated have a “Generate” button which, when pressed, manually generates the AI Overview.
In this study, all the AI Overviews that we found in Google search are partially shown.
Do AI Overviews impact the visibility of the first organic result?
AI Overviews can significantly impact organic traffic and visibility in several ways:
Decreased Organic Visibility
AI Overviews are snapshots that appear before organic search results, often occupying a large portion of the screen with an average height of 912 pixels when expanded (399 pixels when closed).
If we look for the first organic result, when the AI Overview is expanded the average depth is 1,674 pixels, which exceeds the typical screen resolution (1920 x 1080 pixels). This is how much searchers need to scroll to see the first organic result, which can reduce organic website traffic.
Shift in User Behavior
AI Overviews give short answers most of the time, leading users to rely on these summaries instead of scrolling through organic results. This also alters the typical user web journey and impacts organic traffic.
Metrics Impact
The presence of AI Overviews can also affect metrics related to organic traffic, such as organic revenue. With fewer site visitors, the potential for conversions into followers, leads, or customers decreases.
Do AI Overviews appear together with other SERP features?
Many times when AI Overviews are shown, they are accompanied by other SERP features, such as People Also Ask, Featured snippets, Discussions & forums, Images and Videos.
The chart above shows that when AI Overviews appear, they are almost always accompanied by the People also ask SERP feature. This happens in 99.5% of the cases.
Other notable SERP features that appear together with AI Overviews are:
Featured snippets: 59.5% of the cases
Discussions & forums: 58.8% of the cases
Videos: 69.7% of the cases
Images: 30.5% of the cases
Does this mean that the display of the AI Overview is influenced by these SERP features? Or is it just the search intent that triggers all these SERP features to show up together?
How about the cases when AI Overviews are not displayed in the SERP?
These are the SERP features that are shown most often when no AI Overviews are shown in the SERP.
Here we notice a few different SERP features that are not in the previous chart. It looks like no AI Overviews are shown when Products, Local packs, Sitelinks, and Knowledge panels appear in the SERP.
Will AI Overviews replace Featured Snippets?
As we have seen in the charts above, when AI Overviews are shown, Featured snippets are also displayed in 59.5% of the cases.
Although the information shown is somewhat similar in these two SERP features, AI Overviews and Featured Snippets serve distinct purposes in search engine results.
To get a better picture of the two, let’s first break down the differences between them:
AI Overviews
AI Overviews are generated using advanced artificial intelligence algorithms. They can synthesize information from multiple sources and create summaries. They also offer a more interactive experience, sometimes allowing users to refine or expand the information provided. These overviews often aggregate content from a variety of sources, providing a broader perspective on the topic.
Featured Snippets
Featured Snippets are extracted from a single web page that the search engine deems most relevant to the user's query. The content is directly lifted from that source without modification. They aim to answer the query concisely and directly, often in the form of a paragraph, list, or table.
Featured Snippets provide a direct link to the source page from which the content was taken, allowing users to click through for more detailed information.
Both features aim to enhance the user experience by providing quick and relevant information, but they differ significantly in their approach and execution.
Do AI Overviews appear together with Featured snippets in the search results?
According to our study, from all the 8,000 keywords analyzed, Featured Snippets appear more frequently, showing up in 17.69% of cases, while AI Overviews appear in only 12.47% of cases.
In only 7.42% of cases, Featured Snippets and AI Overviews are displayed together. Here’s an example:
How are Google Ads influenced by AI Overviews?
AI Overviews are designed to complement and enhance the search experience. Depending on the query, Google may also show ads alongside AI Overviews.
About 8.74% of the queries displayed ads at the top and 19.50% of the queries showed ads at the bottom of the SERP when AI Overviews were present.
In all instances, the top ads were displayed above the AI Overviews.
Here's how AI Overviews can influence Google Ads:
User Engagement
The presence of AI Overviews can impact the click-through rates of Google Ads. If the overview provides sufficient information, users may choose not to click on ads.
Conversely, well-integrated overviews might enhance ad appeal, leading to higher CTRs. By providing immediate answers, AI Overviews can also reduce bounce rates, keeping users engaged with the search results and potentially increasing the chances of interaction with ads.
Impact on Ad Bidding
The effectiveness of AI Overviews can influence the cost-per-click (CPC) for advertisers. Highly relevant overviews that match user intent well might lead to more competitive bidding for ads displayed alongside these summaries.
AI Overviews could also affect the ad rank by influencing Quality Score components such as expected CTR and ad relevance. Ads that complement AI-generated content well may achieve better ad positions.
How are Shopping Ads displayed alongside AI Overviews?
Search ads are text-based. They include a headline, description, URL, and sometimes ad extensions like site links or call buttons.
Shopping ads are different. They are highly visual and more prominent. They include a product image, title, price, store name, and sometimes additional information like reviews or special offers. These ads are specifically designed to promote individual products. They are ideal for e-commerce businesses looking to drive sales for specific items.
While search ads are often displayed alongside AI Overviews, we haven’t seen that many Shopping ads displayed together with AI Overviews. In those 0.1% of the cases, the shopping ads were always displayed below the AI Overviews.
Which queries are more likely to trigger an AI Overview?
Queries that are more likely to trigger an AI Overview are typically 5 words long and include common terms such as "how", "SEO", "safety", "tips", "practices", “manage”, "understanding", "importance", "prepare" and "best."
These types of queries often seek comprehensive and informative responses, which AI Overviews are designed to provide.
How many links/sources are featured in AI Overviews?
The number of links (or sources) in AI Overviews ranges from 1 to 20, with an average of 7 to 8 links. These links typically point to different domains, with the average number of domains also being around 7.
Which domains are featured in AI Overviews as sources?
We found that two major domains are featured most frequently in the AI Overviews:
linkedin.com with 2.79% of queries
youtube.com with 2.29% of queries
Since most of the AI Overviews appear for health-related queries, the top domains include major sites from this niche:
mayoclinic.org with 3.39% of queries
healthline.com with 2.29% of queries
The websites that appear in AI Overviews are trusted information sources and are highly visible in organic search results.
The presence of niche-specific domains like mayoclinic.com and webmd.com as top-linked sources suggests that Google is prioritizing sites with deep expertise in specific topics.
Do you need to rank high organically to appear in SGE results?
You would think that Google would show mostly top organic ranking domains as sources for the AI Overviews, right? Wrong. Only 33.42% of the sources contained domains that rank in the top 10 organic results, while 46.54% of them are domains that are not found in the top 50.
AI Overview Visibility by Intent
Does keyword intent affect the appearance of AI Overviews?
Keyword intent is very important for the content and layout of AI Overviews in Google search results. By understanding what users are looking for, Google aims to provide the most relevant and helpful information right in the search results, improving the overall experience.
Here’s how keyword intent influences the AI Overviews:
Informational Intent
Example: "How to bake a cake"
AI Overviews for informational queries typically provide a detailed, step-by-step guide or a comprehensive explanation directly in the search results. These overviews may include summaries from multiple sources, relevant facts, and sometimes visual elements like images.
For informational queries, we found that AI Overviews appear in 21.29% of cases.
Navigational Intent
Examples: "Facebook login"
There are very few AI Overviews for navigational queries, but when they appear, they usually focus on providing quick access links, highlighting the official website or platform, and showing direct navigation links.
For navigational queries, we found that AI Overviews appear only in 0.09% of cases.
Commercial Intent
Examples: "Best smartphones 2024"
These overviews provide comparisons, expert reviews, and summaries of the best options available. They aim to help users make informed decisions by aggregating information from various review sites and expert opinions.
For commercial queries, we found that AI Overviews appear only in 3.49% of cases.
Transactional Intent
Examples: "Buy iPhone 14"
AI Overviews for transactional queries are also rare. They feature shopping-related information, such as product comparisons, price ranges, reviews, and direct links to purchase options. These overviews are designed to facilitate quick decision-making and purchasing.
For transactional queries, we found that AI Overviews appear only in 0.47% of cases.
AI Overview Visibility by Industry
Which industries show AI Overviews more frequently?
The bar chart below shows the frequency of AI overviews across different industries.
This indicates that AI overviews are more prevalent in industries related to health, safety, and technology, while they are less common in other sectors.
Keywords from the Health (67.47%) and Safety (46.09%) niches are more likely to trigger AI Overviews.
At the same time, at the opposite end of the spectrum, with the lowest percentage of keywords that generate an AI Overview are: eCommerce, Entertainment and Real Estate niches.
Comparative data visualizations
The Investment niche stands out with the most compact AI Overviews - an average of just 765.35 pixels when expanded and a word count of 138. This is way below the 912 pixels and 169 words global averages for AI Overviews.
But AI Overviews can get much lengthier than that.
AI Overviews take up most SERP real estate for queries from the SEO (958 pixels) and Education (957 pixels) niches.
AI Overviews are not the only ones pushing organic results lower on SERPs.
For example, although Investment-related queries generated considerably shorter AI Overviews (765 pixels) than Automotive queries (950 pixels), we typically found that the 1st organic listing was lower on the page for Investment queries (1,407 pixels) than for Automotive queries (1,359 pixels).
The components of AI Overviews differ significantly across industries:
While lists are more prevalent in AI Overviews for eCommerce, Real Estate or Entertainment queries, we found that paragraphs of texts are more popular for Investment and Insurance queries.
For the Investment niche, AI Overviews provide among the fewest visibility opportunities for websites, with an average of only 4.5 domains cited through 5.6 links. However, this isn't entirely negative, as 40.9% of these pages are sourced from search results below the 50th position.
Ads appeared for almost a third (28.3%) of all the queries that generated an AI Overview.
Most frequently, we're talking about Bottom Ads. We've only seen Top Ads and AI Overviews in a handful of industries: Finance, Investment, Legal, Safety, and Health. While Shopping Ads barely appeared for a few Health queries (0.3% of SERPs with AI Overviews).
For half the industries that we tracked, no ads appeared at the same time with AI Overviews: Automotive, eCommerce, Entertainment, Food and Beverage, Insurance, Real Estate, and Travel.
Meanwhile, Featured Snippets appear together with AI Overviews for merely 7.42% of searches, predominantly from the Health and Safety niches.
Conclusion
The main goal with this study was to understand how AI Overviews affect search experiences, different query intents, and industries.
Some of the key findings include:
AI Overviews appear in only 12% of analyzed keywords, mostly health-related.
They significantly push organic search results down the page.
I believe AI Overviews mark a major shift in search technology, offering quick, summarized information directly in search results. This affects organic traffic and user behavior, as users often get their answers without clicking through to websites.
If you own a website, you definitely need to think about how to optimize your content to be included in these AI Overviews and adapt your SEO strategy to secure your visibility in Google search.
Did you find this study interesting? I would love to hear what you think.
Article by
Philip Petrescu
Philip is the CEO and Co-Founder of Caphyon, managing the team that is building Advanced Web Ranking since 2003.
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