Google now shows how often your pages appear inside AI Overviews and AI Mode, and this one-page checklist tells you what to do with that data. Work down the sections in order, and keep the page open the first time you look at the new report.
The report and its companion opt-out toggle are still rolling out. Some items below will apply today, and others will apply once the features reach your account.
What Launched on June 3, 2026
Google added dedicated Generative AI performance reports to Google Search Console on June 3, 2026. Before that date, impressions from AI Overviews were folded into your overall performance numbers with no way to separate them.
The new standalone view covers AI Overviews, AI Mode and AI-powered results in Google Discover. Google also added a control that lets you exclude your site from those features without touching your standard rankings.
Section 1: Confirm You Have the Report
- Look for the new section. The rollout started with a subset of UK website owners, driven in part by requirements from the UK Competition and Markets Authority.
- Check back weekly if it is not there. Google plans a global rollout but has not set a specific date.
- Note the start date of the data. Figures begin on May 18, 2026, with no historical backfill, so the report cannot compare against last year.
Section 2: Know the Breakdowns It Shows
- Impressions: how often your pages appeared inside an AI feature.
- Pages: the specific URLs that showed up.
- Countries: where those appearances happened.
- Devices: desktop compared with mobile, for Search only.
- Dates: views that run from hourly through monthly.
Section 3: Note What Is Missing
- No click data. The report counts impressions only, with no click-through rate and no average position.
- No query detail. You might see that your homepage appeared in AI Overviews 800 times last week, yet you cannot see which questions triggered it.
- No timeline for more metrics. Google says it plans to add more over time but has not said when clicks or queries will arrive.
- A second source for now. Bing Webmaster Tools launched its own AI performance report in February 2026, and it already shows citation queries and page-level citation activity.
Section 4: Compare AI and Organic Numbers
- Compare the same pages. Set AI impression volume beside those pages in your regular organic data.
- Flag pages with AI impressions but few visits. Your content may be summarized without prompting a click, so add stronger calls to action or more specific, decision-focused content.
- Flag pages with strong organic traffic but zero AI impressions. Those pages may need better structure, clearer headings or more direct answers to common questions.
- Pull citation queries from Bing. Use Bing Webmaster Tools for query data while the Google report matures.
Section 5: Weigh the Opt-Out Toggle Carefully
- Know where it lives. The control sits under Settings > AI controls > Search generative AI, and choosing "Exclude" removes your site from AI Overviews, AI Mode and AI features in Discover.
- Know when it started. The setting took effect on June 17, 2026.
- Know what you lose. An excluded site earns no impressions and no clicks from those AI features.
- Know what stays. Your regular organic rankings and your Discover feed presence are not affected.
- Know how it differs. Google-Extended blocks training, and nosnippet removes your organic snippet as well, so neither one matches the toggle.
For most small businesses, opting out would be the wrong move. AI Overviews reach a very large share of monthly Google users, and excluding your site gives up that brand exposure entirely.
A news site or a business that depends on direct clicks for ad revenue may have a reason to think harder. Even then, weigh the trade-off with real numbers before you flip the switch.
Section 6: Clear Technical Blocks
- Check robots.txt. Settings there can stop AI crawlers from reaching your pages.
- Check your content delivery network. Its configuration can block AI crawlers just as completely.
- Fix blocks before anything else. If crawlers cannot reach a page, it will not appear in AI features no matter how good the content is.
Why the Report Matters
AI Overviews appear for roughly half of all Google searches. Over the past year, the overlap between traditional top-10 rankings and AI citation sources has dropped significantly, so a page can rank well and still miss the AI answer.
Clicks and rankings used to be the main signals of a working website. AI visibility is now a third signal, especially for local services, professional fields and product categories where buyers research before they reach out.
By building these reports into Search Console, Google is treating AI Overviews and AI Mode as distinct traffic channels. The good news is that clear writing, specific answers, structured pages and accurate business information help you in both places.
Get Help With Your Report
If you want help reading your Search Console data, building content that earns AI citations or finding technical issues that block AI crawlers, we are ready. Contact us or schedule a call, and we will look at where your site stands today.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Which numbers can I see in the new Search Console AI report?
You can see impressions your pages earn inside Google AI Overviews and AI Mode, split by page, country, device and date. Clicks and query-level detail are not part of the report yet.
If I switch on the AI opt-out, will my normal Google rankings drop?
No. Google confirmed the toggle leaves your standard organic rankings alone. Your pages stay in regular search results and the Discover feed, and you give up only the impressions and traffic that AI Overviews and AI Mode would have sent.
Why not just use Google-Extended or the nosnippet tag instead of the toggle?
Each control does a different job. Google-Extended stops AI model training but not AI Overviews, and nosnippet blocks AI features while also stripping your organic snippet. The Search Console toggle is the first control that blocks AI features and keeps that snippet in place.
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