Are people leaving Google for ChatGPT?

Some queries are shifting, but Google still handles the vast majority of searches and has folded AI directly into results with AI Overviews and AI Mode. Prefer tracks what ChatGPT and Google's AI Overviews and AI Mode say about your brand. The bigger change is not people leaving Google, it is Google answering more questions itself, which changes SEO more than it ends it.

Do AI Overviews reduce traffic to my site?

They reduce clicks on some queries. Prefer shows whether your site is cited inside those AI answers and, with Search Console connected, what happened to your clicks. Pew found clicks on a traditional result dropped from 15% to 8% when an AI summary appeared. But the citation inside the answer becomes the new visibility, so the goal shifts from ranking to being the cited source.

Should I stop doing SEO because of AI search?

No. Prefer tracks AI citations next to Search Console and GA4 for that reason: AI Overviews are built on Google's standard index, so being crawlable and answering clearly still drives both classic rankings and AI citations. AI search adds a layer of optimization on top of SEO; it does not remove the foundation.

Is AI search replacing Google?

Not yet. AI search is changing Google and taking some clicks, but it adds a layer, not a replacement. Prefer tracks Google's AI answers and ChatGPT's.

Javed Khatri Co-founder, Prefer

5 September 2026 Updated 2 October 2026 2 min read Answer

The short answer

Will AI search replace Google?

Not yet: AI search is reshaping Google from the inside with AI Overviews and AI Mode, and it takes some clicks, but for most people Google is the AI search engine. Treat it as a new layer: Prefer tracks your brand in Google's two AI surfaces and in ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity.

Key takeaways

Pew Research tracked 900 US adults across 68,879 searches: when an AI summary appeared, users clicked a traditional result on 8% of visits versus 15% without one, and clicked a link inside the summary on just 1%. (Pew Research Center, July 2025)
Across 10 million+ US keywords, Google AI Overviews appeared on 6.5% of queries in January 2025, peaked near 25% in July, and settled under 16% by November 2025 (Semrush AI Overviews Study). (Search Engine Land's read of the Semrush AI Overviews Study)
Commercial-intent AI Overviews then grew 71% over the following six months into 2026 (Semrush commercial-search study). (Semrush AI Overviews commercial-search study)
Semrush's matched-keyword data found zero-click rates fell slightly after AI Overviews appeared (33.75% to 31.53%), so AI answers have not caused the click collapse some predicted. (Search Engine Land's read of the Semrush data)
Prefer, our product, tracks citations and mentions of your brand in Google AI Overviews, Google AI Mode, ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity, on every plan. (Prefer pricing (our product))

What the data shows#

AI search is changing Google, not replacing it. That is why Prefer tracks Google’s AI Overviews and AI Mode alongside ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity. The clearest evidence is inside Google’s own results, where AI Overviews now answer a large share of queries directly. Across 10 million US keywords, Semrush measured AI Overviews on 6.5% of queries in January 2025, a peak near 25% in July, and a settle under 16% by November. Coverage swings because Google is still tuning where the feature belongs, but the mix underneath is moving toward money queries: commercial-intent AI Overviews grew 71% into 2026.

That shift changes behavior. Pew Research tracked 900 US adults across 68,879 real searches and found that when an AI summary appeared, people clicked a traditional result on only 8% of visits, versus 15% without one, and clicked a link inside the summary just 1% of the time. So AI answers do take clicks, especially the informational ones a search used to send onward.

But the wholesale collapse people predicted has not shown up. On the same matched keywords, Semrush found zero-click rates actually fell slightly after AI Overviews appeared, from 33.75% to 31.53%. The honest read is fewer, more qualified clicks, not the end of search traffic.

It is a complement, not a replacement, yet#

For most people, Google is still the AI search engine. They are not choosing between Google and AI; they are getting AI inside Google. That is why “replacing” is the wrong frame today:

The distribution has not moved. Google still handles the overwhelming majority of searches, and it now serves AI answers within that same surface through AI Overviews and AI Mode.
The foundation is shared. Google states AI Overviews and AI Mode need no special optimization beyond standard SEO, so the same crawlable, clearly-answered pages feed both classic rankings and AI citations.
The job changes, not the channel. The work shifts from ranking a page to being the source an answer cites. When the answer is the destination, the citation becomes the visibility.

There is real substitution at the edges: some buyers now start category and comparison research in ChatGPT or Perplexity instead of a search box. That is exactly why measurement has to go cross-engine rather than Google-only. Track the same buyer questions across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, and Google AI Overviews so you see where attention is actually going.

The practical move is not to abandon Google or to bet everything on one AI engine. It is to treat AI search as a new layer and win the citation on every surface your buyers use. Our guide to appearing in Google AI Overviews covers the on-page work, and the AI search citation statistics show how fragmented the engines really are. To see how the engines describe and cite your brand today, run a free AI visibility audit.

Sources