Google Search Console dashboard showing the new generative AI features performance report

The 30-second version

  • What: Google adds a generative AI performance report to Search Console plus a toggle to block your content from AI Overviews and AI Mode.
  • When: announced June 2, 2026, rollout in progress.
  • The report shows: impressions, pages, countries, devices, dates, but not clicks.
  • The catch: opting out of AI means zero traffic AND zero impressions from generative responses. It's all or nothing.

On June 2, 2026, Google announced two additions to Search Console: a dedicated performance report for generative AI features and a toggle to block your content from AI Overviews and AI Mode, according to an announcement on Google's official blog and reported on June 3 by Search Engine Land. For the first time, publishers can both measure and refuse their presence in Google's AI-generated answers.

What the report does (and doesn't) show

The new "Search Generative AI" report surfaces data that was invisible until now: the number of impressions your URLs get inside AI Overviews and AI Mode, the pages involved, the countries, the device types and the dates. That's a genuine step forward: until now, these appearances were blended into the standard performance report with no way to isolate them.

But one metric is missing, and it's the most important one: clicks. Google doesn't tell you how many visitors an appearance in an AI answer actually sends to your site. The company says it's "continuing to work with website owners to understand what insights will be most helpful" and promises to "introduce additional metrics over time." In plain terms: you'll know you're being cited, not what it earns you.

Why it's strategic: measuring your AI impressions finally lets you prove that generative-visibility work exists. On that point, Search Console catches up with what we were already seeing: AI Overviews now cover 86% of business queries in France.

The divisive toggle: blocking AI, at what cost?

The second feature is more radical. An opt-out toggle prevents your content from appearing in AI Overviews, AI Mode and AI Overviews in Discover. Google reassures on one crucial point: turning this control on does not affect your ranking in regular Search and is not used as a ranking signal.

The downside is blunt: a site that opts out "will not receive traffic or impressions from our generative AI features." No middle ground. You can't say "cite me but send me traffic" : which is exactly the trade-off publishers were asking for and Google won't grant. At launch, the toggle is limited to a subset of website owners in the UK, ahead of a wider rollout.

5metrics in the report (impressions, pages, countries, devices, dates)
0clicks reported for now
UKfirst sites eligible for opt-out

What it changes for small and mid-sized businesses

Practically, three reflexes matter once the report lands on your account:

  1. Watch your AI impressions as soon as the report opens. It's your new generative-visibility barometer, cross-reference it with real traffic to gauge how dependent your business is on AI Overviews.
  2. Don't touch the opt-out toggle by reflex. For an SMB selling products or services, disappearing from AI answers means going invisible where a growing share of decisions are made. The opt-out is mainly for news publishers in content-rights disputes.
  3. Optimize to be cited, not to flee. The right answer to generative AI isn't to block it, it's to produce the content it cites: direct answers, sourced data, niche expertise.

This logic extends what we've documented for months: Google surfaces "preferred sources" in its AI Overviews, and the debate over falling traffic to websites has never been louder. The Search Console report simply makes the phenomenon measurable.

Not sure whether AI is citing your site?

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The limits of this announcement

Three grey areas remain. First, the absence of clicks makes any ROI calculation impossible: an AI impression isn't worth the same depending on whether it drives a visit or merely displays your answer. Second, the rollout is limited: the opt-out toggle is currently open only to a handful of UK sites, and the timeline for other countries is unknown. Finally, this article doesn't cover the pre-existing technical controls (nosnippet tags, robots.txt) or how they interact with this new toggle: Google hasn't detailed how they fit together.

Our take

Handing out the opt-out toggle is mostly about defusing regulatory and media pressure. But for 99% of SMBs, the real question isn't whether to leave AI, it's how to be cited there on good terms. The performance report, on the other hand, is the tool we'd been waiting for: it turns generative visibility from a hunch into a number. And what gets measured eventually gets managed.

Sources

Frequently asked questions

What does the new Search Console AI performance report measure?
It shows impressions of your URLs in AI Overviews and AI Mode, the pages involved, countries, device types and dates. For now, it does not include the clicks driven back to your site from an AI response.
Will blocking my content from AI Overviews hurt my Google rankings?
No. Google states the opt-out does not affect your ranking in regular Search and is not used as a ranking signal. However, the site will no longer receive any traffic or impressions from generative AI features.
Is the opt-out toggle available outside the UK?
Not yet. At launch on June 2, 2026, the control is limited to a subset of website owners in the UK. Google plans to expand access to other countries after a testing phase.
Alexis Dollé, founder of Cicéro
Alexis Dollé
CEO & Founder

Growth and SEO content strategist, I founded Cicéro to help businesses build lasting organic visibility, on Google and in AI-generated answers alike. Every piece of content we produce is designed to convert, not just to exist.

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