AI Overviews top 80% of searches: Semrush finds 88% of 400 US commercial keywords
On October 26, 2026 Search Engine Roundtable reported that AI Overviews now show for over 80% of Google searches. The post points to Semrush, SE Ranking and seoClarity data; two of these are new studies, Semrush on US commercial keywords (88%) and SE Ranking on US brand searches (82.5%). Both are vendor data and both measure appearance only.
Three data providers are cited, and the figures differ
In its October 26, 2026 post, Search Engine Roundtable's Barry Schwartz wrote that "AI Overviews now show up for over 80% of Google Searches". He sets that against 50% in June last year and about 15% the year before that. The post names Semrush, SE Ranking and seoClarity as the data behind the claim, but it does not tie the headline figure to one specific dataset.
That is why we keep the numbers apart. Semrush's study of October 21, 2026 covers commercial keywords, while SE Ranking's study of October 22, 2026 covers brand searches. Mark Traphagen of seoClarity also told Schwartz about a month earlier that AI Overviews appeared on over 62% of queries, ranging from 55% to 84% by industry. We covered the topic through branded searches on October 5; this story continues that picture.
Semrush and SE Ranking measured different things
Semrush followed a fixed list of 400 commercial keywords across banking, ecommerce and software each month on its US desktop data, from September 2025 through August 2026. Keyword-weighted coverage rose from 45.75% to 88%. Weighted by search volume it reached 97.08% in August 2026, and the 12% of keywords without an AI Overview made up under 3% of volume. Ecommerce climbed from 32.62% to 85.11%, and by August 2026 all three industries sat between 85% and 91%.
By query type, "reviews" rose about 59 points and "best X for Y" about 53.4 points, with types ranging from 82.05% to 96.12% in August 2026. SE Ranking checked 1,000 US and 1,000 German brand keywords across 17 industries three times each on desktop in October 2026. The US average over the three checks was 82.5% and Germany's was 40.4%. PPC Land relays Semrush's 88% figure and notes that the study tracks whether AI Overviews appear, not clicks or traffic.
Summaries are becoming the default, but traffic impact was not measured
On commercial queries an AI Overview is close to a standard page element. Semrush says as much: a year earlier about 30% of the "reviews" searches it tracked showed one, now nearly 90% do, and it adds that ranking first likely will not bring as much traffic as before. Schwartz likewise describes Google as aiming to have an answer for every query.
The limits are clear, though. The Semrush data is US desktop, a fixed 400-keyword sample and a vendor study rather than Google's own figure. The SE Ranking study does not assess accuracy, traffic or conversions. PPC Land also relays Marie Haynes's finding, from 12 months of GA4 data on 100 sites, that ChatGPT sessions were 0.62% of Google organic volume. Appearance rates alone do not show the effect on clicks; only your own data can show that.
The sources have no Türkiye data, so this section is commentary
None of the four sources contains AI Overviews data on Türkiye; the measurements rest on US and German samples. This section is not a fact drawn from the sources but UNALSOFT commentary.
Our reading: these studies cannot tell you the AI Overview rate for Turkish-language queries. Germany coming in at roughly half the US rate hints that country-to-country differences can be large. The sturdiest approach is to track the local effect in your own Search Console data, for your own keywords.
The UNALSOFT view
We read this as a reminder about measurement discipline, not as news that rankings are over. For commercial pages, splitting review, comparison and pricing information into clear, short sections may help readers and the sources summaries cite, and Semrush also recommends keeping comparison pages current. The practical step is simple: list your key queries, then track whether a summary appears and how clicks change in your own data. Page structure is part of our web design service.
Do AI Overviews show on your queries, and what are clicks doing?
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