Google AI Overviews Cut Publisher Traffic by 40%

A new study reveals that Google's AI Overviews (AIOs) reduce traffic to content publishers by 39.8%, potentially disrupting the online information ecosystem.

The researchers conducted a field experiment with over 1,000 users who installed a custom Chrome extension in early 2026 and observed their behavior for two weeks.

The results show that AIOs decreased organic clicks to third-party sites by 39.8% and increased searches where the user clicked on no links at all by 34.5%, but had no impact on click quality or search frequency.

The study's findings have implications for platform regulation, copyright law, and competition policy, particularly in regards to self-preferencing concerns and market effects.