Google became a verb for search long before AI chatbots arrived to answer their first prompt, but now those two trends are merging as Google solidified AI’s position in search with the full rollout of AI Mode for all US Google Search users. Google made the announcement as part of Google I/O, which is underway in California.
Finding results from a generative model that often gives you everything you need on the Google result page is a fundamental shift in traditional web search paradigms.
For over 25 years now, we’ve traditionally searched on a term, phrase, or even complete thought and found pages and pages of links. The first page is the links that matter most in that they’ll mostly closely align with your query. It’s no secret that companies, including the one I work at, fight tooth and nail to create content that lives on the first page of those results.
Things began to change in the realm of Google Search when Google introduced AI Overviews in 2023. As of this week, they’re used by 1.5 billion monthly users, according to Google.
Where AI Overview was a light-touch approach to introducing generative AI to search, AI Mode goes deeper and further. The latest version of AI Mode, introduced at Google I/O 2025, adds more advanced reasoning and can handle even longer and more complex queries.
Suffice it to say, your Google Search experience may never be the same.
View from the top
Google CEO Sundar Pichai, though, has a different view. In a conversation with reporters before Google I/O and in answer to a question about the rise of AI chatbots like Gemini and the role of search, Pichai said, “It’s been a pretty exciting moment for search.”
He said that engagement with AI Overviews and even the limited AI Modes tests has shown increased engagement, with people spending more time in search and inputting longer and longer queries.
No one asked if the rise of chatbots could mean the end of search as we know it, but perhaps Pichai inferred the subtext, adding, “It’s very far from a zero-sum moment.”
If anything, Pichai noted, “People, I think, are just getting more curious; people are using a lot of this a lot more. “
While AI Overview is often accused of having some factual issues, Google is promising that AI mode, which uses more powerful models than AI Overview, will be more accurate. “AI Mode uses more powerful models and uses more reasoning across – sort of doing more work– …and so it reaches an even higher bar,” said Google Search Head Liz Reid.
As for where search is going, Pichai sees features like AI Mode “expanding use cases”. He also thinks that agentic AI is “giving people glimpses of a proactive world.”
I think, by this, Pichai means that AI-powered search will eventually learn your needs and do your bidding, even if your query or prompt doesn’t fully describe your need.
What that means in practice is still up for debate, but for Google and Picahi, the advent of AI in search is all upside.
“I do think it’s made the Web itself more exciting. People are engaging a lot more across the board, and so it’s a very positive moment for us.”
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lance.ulanoff@futurenet.com (Lance Ulanoff)
