🔍 Read the full analysis: Google Makes A Global Push With Ads In AI Search on ThorstenMeyerAI.com
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TL;DR
Google said on Oct. 28 it would expand ads in AI Mode to 10 more countries and begin showing them in U.S. follow-up questions. The announcement comes as Google Search & other revenue growth slowed to 12% in the third quarter; the effects on publisher traffic and ad revenue remain unsettled.
The new AI Mode markets are Australia, Canada, India, Kenya, Malaysia, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines and Singapore. Google said Brazil, Mexico and the United Kingdom are planned for the fourth quarter of 2026. In the United States, the company is launching what it calls “multiturn ads,” allowing ads to appear in responses to later questions in an AI Mode conversation, not only the initial query.
Google’s announcement, attributed in the source material to Shashi Thakur, who leads its search ads business, also says ads in AI answers will carry a “Sponsored” label. Existing Search, Shopping and Performance Max campaigns can participate automatically, according to Google Ads Help. Advertisers have no separate targeting or opt-out for these placements, the help material says; reporting is aggregated, and Google-generated explanations beside ads cannot be edited by advertisers.
The expansion covers two related products. AI Overviews are summaries shown within standard search results; AI Mode is a separate, chat-style search product that supports extended queries and follow-ups. The source describes AI Overview ad placements as already available in the United States, with AI Mode ads previously under testing. Google says AI Mode queries average three times the length of conventional searches, and that sponsored and organic product-list items had similar click-through rates in internal U.S. data collected Aug. 20 to Sept. 3, 2026. That comparison concerns product-list items within AI Mode, not clicks to publisher websites.
Infographic 01 · From test to global
The answer now carries the ad, in more places.
How Google moved ads into its AI answers in two years, where they show today, and the revenue pressure behind the move.
Where ads appear inside AI answers
Per Google’s help page and the 28 Oct post. The list “may not be exhaustive”.
Follow-up questions (“multiturn ads”): US only. Germany and the rest of the EU: not listed. Ads above or below AI Overviews can show wherever AI Overviews exist (200+ countries and territories).
Why now: Google Search & other revenue growth
Year over year, as reported by Alphabet. Bars scaled to 19%.
Q2 to Q3 2026: about +0.1%. Same months a year earlier: about +4.4% (my arithmetic). Google names exchange rates as the largest driver of the slowdown, and the “lower monetization” of AI Mode as one factor.
- 3 Oct 2024Ads inside AI Overviews go liveUS, mobile, after months of testing
- 21 May 2025Desktop in the US; first tests in AI ModeEnglish-speaking countries announced for later in 2025
- 20 May 2026New formats in testingConversational Discovery ads and Highlighted Answers, both with a Gemini-written “AI explainer”
- 28 Oct 2026AI Mode ads in 10 more countriesPlus “multiturn ads” in follow-up questions in the US; labeled “Sponsored”
- Q4 2026Planned: Brazil, Mexico, United Kingdom“Additional locales, including” these three
Sources: Google, 28 Oct 2026; Google Ads Help, accessed 29 Oct 2026; Google, 3 Oct 2024; Google, 21 May 2025; Google, 20 May 2026; Alphabet Q3 2026 release and the Q4 2025, Q1 2026 and Q2 2026 releases. “3× longer” is Google’s AI Mode report (US, May 2026). Quarter-on-quarter changes and bar scaling: Thorsten Meyer.
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Ads Follow the AI Search Conversation
The expansion could change where advertisers reach people and how users encounter commercial results. Ads can now appear not just alongside a summary or an initial search, but during a continuing exchange in which a user clarifies a need. Google says the longer queries give it more information about user intent, but the company has not provided independent evidence in the material supplied that this produces better outcomes for advertisers or users.
For publishers, the central issue is whether AI answers redirect attention away from websites while preserving or expanding advertising opportunities for Google. A randomized experiment involving 1,065 U.S. users, described in the source as a 2026 working paper by Agarwal and Sen, found that AI Overviews reduced clicks to websites by 39.8% when they appeared; the study found no measurable change in ad clicks. The finding is from a working paper, not a peer-reviewed paper, and it concerns AI Overviews rather than the newly expanded AI Mode placements. It suggests a possible difference between the effect on publisher referrals and on ad activity, but does not establish what the international rollout will do.
Search remains a major source of revenue for Alphabet and a key route through which many websites attract visitors. If AI answers keep users on Google while ads continue to appear within those answers, publishers could face fewer visits even as Google retains commercial value from the search session. The scale and distribution of any such effect are not yet known.
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From AI Overview Ads to Follow-Ups
Google has introduced AI search advertising in stages. According to the company’s published timeline in the source material, ads in AI Overviews went live for U.S. mobile users in October 2024. Google brought them to desktop in May 2025 and began testing ads in AI Mode around the same time. At Google Marketing Live in May 2026, it started testing formats described as “Conversational Discovery ads,” which use Gemini to tailor ad text to a question, and “Highlighted Answers,” which can place an ad within a list of AI recommendations.
The Oct. 28 announcement extends that rollout beyond the United States and adds ads to later turns in U.S. AI Mode conversations. Separately, Alphabet’s third-quarter results showed Google Search & other revenue of $63.4 billion, up 12% year over year. The supplied source compares that growth with 17% in the previous quarter, 19% in the first quarter of 2026 and 17% in the fourth quarter of 2025.
On the earnings call, Alphabet Chief Business Officer Philipp Schindler cited foreign exchange rates as the largest driver of the slower growth, alongside factors affecting some retail and media advertisers. He also said that strong growth in AI Mode queries affected results because of “the lower monetization we were seeing in AI mode.” Google’s comments link the product shift to revenue performance, but do not quantify how much the AI Mode effect contributed.
““The strong growth in AI Mode queries had an impact because of the lower monetization we were seeing in AI mode.””
— Philipp Schindler, Alphabet chief business officer, on the third-quarter earnings call
Traffic Effects and Ad Controls
Several important details remain unsettled. The supplied material does not give a launch date for each new market, the expected number of users reached, or the share of AI Mode conversations that will contain ads. It also does not quantify the revenue impact Google expects from the expansion or the contribution of lower AI Mode monetization to the third-quarter slowdown.
Google says ads do not influence the AI’s answer, but that is the company’s claim. The source reports no independent audit verifying it. The “Sponsored” label is the stated way to distinguish an ad, but the material does not detail how consistently the label will appear across layouts or how users will interpret placements embedded in conversational results.
The source says Google’s help page listed 12 countries for ads in AI answers, in English, as of Oct. 29, and did not list Germany or other EU countries. That snapshot does not establish a permanent exclusion or explain whether regulatory requirements affect the rollout. The cited publisher-click experiment is also limited: it studied AI Overviews among U.S. users, rather than the new AI Mode markets, and is identified as a working paper.
Rollout and Performance to Watch
Google’s stated next step is the planned fourth-quarter 2026 expansion to Brazil, Mexico and the United Kingdom. The company has not supplied specific dates in the material provided. Advertisers and publishers will be watching for further details about eligibility, placement reporting and how the new formats perform as the rollout broadens.
Future results should clarify whether ads in follow-up questions generate additional commercial activity, and whether AI search changes the balance between clicks to advertisers and visits to publishers. Alphabet’s next financial updates may show how Search revenue growth develops, but revenue figures alone will not isolate the effect of AI Mode from exchange rates and other market factors.
For now, Google’s announcement confirms a wider geographic rollout and a new U.S. placement type. The longer-term effects on user trust, advertiser returns and publisher referrals remain unmeasured in the evidence cited here.
Key Questions
Where is Google expanding ads in AI Mode?
Google named 10 additional countries: Australia, Canada, India, Kenya, Malaysia, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines and Singapore. Brazil, Mexico and the United Kingdom are planned for the fourth quarter of 2026.
What are multiturn ads?
They are ads that can appear in follow-up questions in U.S. AI Mode. Previously, the source describes ads as appearing in the initial query experience; the new placement extends them to later turns in a conversation.
Can advertisers opt out of these placements?
According to Google Ads Help as summarized in the source material, existing Search, Shopping and Performance Max campaigns participate automatically, with no separate opt-out or targeting. Reporting is aggregated, and Google-generated ad explainers cannot be edited by advertisers.
Will ads affect Google’s AI answers?
Google says ads do not influence the AI’s answer and that ads will be labeled “Sponsored.” The material does not cite an independent audit verifying the claim about influence.
Do AI search ads reduce clicks to websites?
The cited 2026 working paper found AI Overviews reduced website clicks by 39.8% when they appeared in an experiment with 1,065 U.S. users, while ad clicks showed no measurable change. That result concerns AI Overviews, not the new AI Mode rollout, so its relevance to the expansion is uncertain.
Source: ThorstenMeyerAI.com
