Google acknowledges that queries made in AI Mode generate less revenue than traditional searches. On October 28, Shivani Mohan, Vice President of Data Science and UX Research for Search at Google, explained on the Ads Decoded podcast that users are entering their purchase journey earlier, with long and detailed questions. The same day, during Alphabet’s quarterly results presentation, Philipp Schindler, SVP and Chief Business Officer of Google, acknowledged that this shift was weighing on revenue.
- Google reconnaît que les requêtes en AI Mode rapportent moins que les recherches classiques.
- Les utilisateurs posent des questions plus longues et entrent plus tôt dans leur parcours d’achat.
- La croissance du chiffre d’affaires de la recherche ralentit : +12 % au troisième trimestre, contre +17 % au deuxième.
- Google lance des publicités multi-tours aux États-Unis, car elle mise sur la monétisation à long terme.
Longer queries earlier in the funnel
For Shivani Mohan, search is going through a period of expansion. It’s becoming easier to turn curiosity into a query, so “people are asking much longer and much more detailed questions.” She also notes that these users are formulating “new types of queries they would never have thought to ask before.” Asked about reformulations, she states that Google penalizes in its metrics queries that force the user to rephrase, and that the increase in follow-up questions reflects new curiosity rather than poor answers.
Follow-up questions are also becoming an issue for advertisers. Google indicates it is launching multi-turn ads in AI Mode in the United States, so that ads can appear in follow-up queries, according to Shashi Thakur, VP and GM of Google Search Ads. According to Mohan, users comparing two products primarily want reviews, podcasts, or videos from people in comparable situations.
Revenue growing less quickly
The figures released by Alphabet illustrate this shift. Google Search and other revenue amounted to $63.35 billion in the third quarter of 2026, up 12% year-on-year, after growth of 19% in the first quarter and 17% in the second. According to the 10-Q filed on October 29, paid clicks on Google Search and other grew 8% year-on-year, compared to 13% in the first two quarters, while the cost per click increased by 4%.
Asked by Doug Anmuth of JPMorgan about query growth outpacing search revenue growth, Philipp Schindler first cited currencies, which he presented as the main factor for the slowdown compared to the second quarter. He then added: “The strong growth in AI Mode queries had an impact due to the lower monetization we were seeing in AI Mode.” He also believes that “the majority of AI Mode queries are incremental, which creates more monetization opportunities over time.”
Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google, compared this moment to the shift to mobile, when the company initially focused on user experience before monetization. According to Reuters, Alphabet had then announced, in the third quarter of 2016, a 33% increase in paid clicks and an 11% decrease in cost per click, as searches shifted to smaller screens and cheaper ads.
