Google Introduces New AI Mode in Search Results

Last May, Google introduced AI Overviews, a new way to help users get answers to specific search queries. AI Overviews provides a quick overview of a topic and links to help users get quick, accurate information. Then, in October, Google expanded the AI ​​Overviews test to more than 100 countries and supported more language options, including English, Hindi, Indonesian, Japanese, Portuguese, and Spanish.

Today, Google announced that AI Overviews in the US is now using the Gemini 2.0 model to provide higher-quality responses to users on difficult questions related to programming, advanced mathematics, and multimodal queries. Google also announced that AI Overviews is now available to users under 18, without even requiring a login.

Along with expanding AI Overviews, Google today announced an early Labs experiment called AI Mode. This new AI Mode is built using a custom version of the Gemini 2.0 model. Google claims that this new feature will be more useful for questions that require deeper exploration, comparison, and inference.

When users post their questions, AI Mode uses a “query fan-out” technique, performing multiple related searches across subtopics and multiple data sources at once, then using AI to aggregate those results and provide a comprehensive response. This makes it easier for users to access more in-depth information than a regular web search on Google. Users can also ask follow-up questions and receive responses.

Google is also working to improve AI Mode with features like adding visual feedback to images and videos, richer formatting, and more.

AI Mode will exist as its own tab alongside the existing Google Search tabs we know and love, including All, Images, News, Shopping, and more. In the AI ​​tab, you'll see related web links like in All, but they'll come with conversational answers and a search bar for follow-up questions, similar to the Gemini app.

AI Mode aims to provide direct answers to users, but this could significantly reduce website traffic for publishers and content creators. The long-term impact of AI Mode on website traffic remains to be determined. To address feedback about potential traffic loss from AI Overviews, Google is testing the inclusion of direct links in AI-generated responses.