Google recently became embroiled in controversy over its AI Overview feature after it reportedly began showing inaccurate and unhelpful answers to searched queries. The tech giant also released a statement claiming it was working to resolve the issue. Now, a new report shows that the visibility of AI overviews has fallen sharply, appearing in only 15% of searched queries. Moreover, it is said that most artificial intelligence functions appear only in truncated form.
Visibility has fallen dramatically due to Google’s AI overview.
According to a report from enterprise SEO platform BrightEdge, the visibility of AI overviews in Google search results began to decline in mid-April. Currently, AI features reportedly appear in only 15% of queries. In addition to reducing the appearance, the report also found that most of the answers collated by the AI were displayed in a truncated format where one could see a scaled-down view of the answers.
The declining visibility is even more noticeable when compared to the feature’s pre-launch appearance. According to the report, the AI overview, which was known as Search Generation Experience (SGE) and was an optional feature before its official launch at the Google I/O event, appeared in 84% of searches. One reason for the lack of visibility is believed to be recent issues with AI capabilities.
Google’s AI overview has faced criticism for being hallucinatory.
Google launched AI Overview to all users in the United States in early May, and soon after, some users began reporting inaccurate and strange responses to some queries. For example, when user In the following days, many users noticed similar issues with this feature.
Last week, the tech giant responded to these criticisms, asserting that it was “working to quickly address these issues through algorithmic improvements or established processes to remove responses that do not comply with our policies.” A separate report claimed that Google was manually turning off AI overview for web queries.
