AI answers are cutting search clicks, and SEO vendors feel it first
Two independent studies, from Pew Research Center and Define Media Group, show Google's AI Overviews pulling clicks off the open web. For the index's 265 SEO firms and 180 content shops, the classic playbook is losing ground.
The demand signal that fed a decade of SEO retainers is thinning at the top of the results page. Google now answers many queries with an AI Overview before a reader reaches a single blue link. Pew Research Center tracked the browsing of more than 900 US adults in March 2025 and found that when an AI summary appeared, users clicked through to a website 8% of the time, against 15% when no summary was present. Only 1% clicked a source link inside the summary itself.
The publisher-side numbers run the same direction. Define Media Group analyzed Google Search Console data across 64 sites and tracked where the traffic went.
Where the search traffic went, by Define Media Group
| Google traffic segment | Change |
|---|---|
| Organic search, immediately after AI Overviews launched | -16% |
| Organic search by Q4 2025 vs the pre-AI-Overview baseline | -42% |
| Breaking-news traffic, November 2024 to early 2026 | +103% |
| Google Discover referrals, same window | +30% |
Read together, the two studies say the clicks are moving more than vanishing. Evergreen how-to pages, the staple of a traditional SEO content plan, are the clearest losers, because an AI summary can answer that kind of query outright. Fast-moving coverage and feed-based surfaces are catching the runoff. Define also found that AI Overviews show up on roughly 15% of news queries, far less than in health or science, which is why breaking news held up while reference content did not.
For a company shopping the index's SEO and content categories, the vetting questions have changed. A vendor whose whole pitch is ranking for informational keywords is selling into a shrinking lane. The sharper questions now are whether the vendor tracks brand citations inside AI answers, whether there is a real plan for Discover and other feed surfaces, and how much of the proposed content targets queries an AI Overview cannot resolve on its own. Rankings still matter. They are no longer the whole scoreboard.
Sources. The figures in this briefing are published by the third parties named below, not computed from The Wall's index. Pew Research Center: Google users are less likely to click on links when an AI summary appears (July 2025) · Search Engine Land: Google AI Overviews cut search clicks 42% (March 2026) · Define Media Group: BREAKING! News Thrives in the Age of AI. The Wall's own sourcing standards: editorial policy.