Google’s AI Overviews killed 58 per cent of publisher clicks. Now it is adding a ‘Further Exploration’ section to bring some back.

Google announced five updates to AI Overviews and AI Mode designed to send more traffic to publishers, including a Further Exploration links section, subscription labels, and inline link context. The changes arrive as AI Overviews face a 58 per cent click-through rate decline, antitrust lawsuits from Penske Media, and EU investigations into whether Google is cannibalising the web content its business depends on.

Google has a publisher problem. AI Overviews, the AI-generated summaries that now appear at the top of search results for a growing share of queries, have been correlated with a 58 per cent reduction in click-through rates to the websites whose content those summaries are built on. Penske Media has filed an antitrust lawsuit. The European Publishers Council has filed a formal complaint with the European Commission. A third of publishers surveyed say they will block AI Overviews once the tools to do so become available. And ...