Google gives links more room in its AI search answers

Links inside AI Overviews and AI Mode answers will appear higher up and more often, Google said. Its AI answers replace the usual list of links, and there are concerns the format cuts traffic to publishers.

Other changes

• Thumbnails on the links that end an answer
• Official sites first for some tasks (test)
• Article carousels in more places and languages
• Clickable publisher and creator names (test)

Google is also changing how other links show up in its AI answers, some of them as tests.

Publishers in Google's paid News AI pilot

400+ publishers

More than 400 publishers now take part in Google's News AI pilot, which pays them for content used to build new AI features, the company said.