AI Overviews Are Slashing Organic CTR: How You Can Benefit
As AI continues to transform how we experience search, new data reveals a dramatic impact on click-through rates (CTR) for traditional organic listings.
According to recent findings, when AI Overviews are present in search results, the average organic CTR drops by over 70%—from 2.94% to just 0.84%. On the flip side, when a website is cited in an AI Overview, CTR increases from 0.6% to 1.08%.
This means that while AI Overviews might be reducing the visibility of traditional listings, being referenced within them could now be more valuable than ranking in the top organic position.
What’s Behind the Shift?
AI Overviews—Google’s generative answers powered by large language models (LLMs)—are starting to dominate the top of the search results page. These summaries attempt to directly answer a user’s question, often without the need to click through to a website. As a result, users are engaging less with traditional organic links unless those sites are specifically cited in the AI-generated content.
Why This Matters
These changes aren’t just cosmetic—they represent a fundamental rethinking of what “ranking” means in 2025.
If you’re still relying on traditional SEO tactics alone, your CTR could suffer as AI Overviews take center stage. But if you pivot your strategy to earn citations within AI summaries, you can reclaim lost visibility—and potentially outperform your previous organic rankings.
What Can You Do?
Here are a few forward-thinking SEO tactics to help your site stay competitive in the AI-driven SERP:
- Prioritize Authoritative, Well-Cited Content: Google’s AI models appear to pull from authoritative sources. If your content is frequently cited by other trusted sites, you’re more likely to be included in AI Overviews.
- Structure Content for Clarity: Break down your content into question-and-answer format, use proper headings, and make sure your key takeaways are easy for AI to extract.
- Track AI-Based Traffic Separately: While less than 0.17% of traffic currently comes from AI search, it’s growing. Use tools that help parse referral data from LLMs like Perplexity, ChatGPT, and Gemini to understand how your content performs across channels.
What’s Next?
According to Google CEO Sundar Pichai, “people use Search more with AI Overviews,” especially younger users. With features like Circle to Search gaining popularity, generative search is quickly becoming the norm, not the exception.
As SEOs, it’s no longer enough to optimize for search engines—we must also optimize for AI assistants, overviews, and answer engines. The rules have changed, and the brands that adapt first will reap the rewards.
