You search for something on Google and at the top there’s an answer instead of a row on the left. The question that follows is simple, and until last month it wasn’t possible to answer it: is my site included in that? Since the end of August, Search Console has been telling me something about that. Not everything, but something.
Something new has been added to Search Console since the end of August
On August 31, 2026, Google rolled out the Generative AI performance report to all websites worldwide. This is stated in the guide to Search Console. It is included with every site that has a Search Console property.
The report covers two places where Google itself provides an answer. AI Overviews, the block that appears above the search results, and AI Mode, the newer way of searching in which Google provides a direct answer.
What the report counts for
One thing: impressions. Google describes that as how often links to your site are shown to a user in such an AI function.
Pay attention to how the counts are done. If two results from your site appear in the same AI response, they are counted in the graph as one display. In the table, it depends on what you’re looking at: for country, device, and date, they are counted per site; for the page dimension, they are counted per page. That sounds like a detail, until you put two numbers side by side and don’t add them up.
What doesn't work, and why that matters
No clicks. No click frequency. No average position. No searches.
That's a problem with the way you're used to looking at things. The regular reports in Search Console all rely on the ratio of impressions to clicks. That ratio doesn't exist here.
An increase in this report means that you will appear more often. Not that more visits will come in. Never consider the two types of impressions as the same.
The report answers one question: do I appear in AI responses? Or that you provide something, it doesn't say. That's a flimsy answer, but a month ago there was no answer at all.
Two reasons why the number might be on the low side
Both of the reasons below point in the same direction: you are probably seeing less than actually happens. So don't be immediately alarmed by a low number.
- What people see in the experimental environment of Google does not count.
- Search Console shows up to a thousand rows. If your site has a lot of searches, you’ll see a truncated list, and it doesn’t say that it’s been truncated.
What you do with it now
Take a look at it once and write down what it says. Not because you can do anything with it today, but because in three months you want to be able to see if anything has changed. Without a starting point, a change is not a change but just a number.
And don't draw any conclusions from just one month. Google itself says that the latest data is preliminary and may change in the hours to come.
Do you want to know what this means for the findability of your site, Then we would be happy to take a look at what’s in your Search Console.
