Prime Highlights:

Google’s AI Summaries are profoundly impacting click-through rates (CTR) for leading organic search results, particularly on non-branded terms.
Two leading studies (Ahrefs and Amsive) show a persistent trend towards falling organic traffic due to AI summaries.

Key Facts:

Ahrefs registered a 34.5% decline in CTR at the first organic position when AI Summaries came into view.
Amsive registered a 15.49% average decline out of 700,000 keywords.
Non-branded search queries experienced the largest drop, with CTR reduced by almost 20%.

Key Background

Google’s AI Summaries—abridged answers right on search result pages—are becoming more impactful in user behavior, and not toward conventional organic rankings. Two detailed studies, one conducted by SEO tool provider Ahrefs and another by digital performance agency Amsive, show a precipitous fall in CTR for sites, especially when AI Summaries are engaged for information-oriented, non-branded terms.

Ahrefs examined 300,000 keywords based on their platforms and Google Search Console’s data by comparing pre-and post-March 2025 U.S. launch CTR metrics for AI Overviews. According to what they discovered, when there is an AI Overview, the top organic CTR falls 34.5%. That percentage increases even further if there is that overview as one of those features in co-occurrence alongside other SERP features, i.e., featured snippets.

Amsive’s analysis of 700,000 keywords on 10 sites and five industries confirms these results. According to their findings, there was an average 15.49% CTR reduction, with the strongest effect on non-top-three search positions—experiencing a 27% reduction. The fall was even greater—37.04%—when AI Overviews were combined with featured snippets.

The most impacted search terms are informational and non-branded queries, which are more likely to trigger AI Overviews. In such instances, Amsive noticed a 19.98% decrease in CTR. Such queries usually comprise a major part of organic traffic for content-driven websites.

Notably, branded keywords have performed better. AI Overviews show up in only 4.79% of branded queries, and when they do, those listings receive an 18.68% CTR increase—presumably because users know and trust the brand.

These tests call into question Google’s assertions that AI Overviews increase user interaction and produce higher-quality clicks. While Google implies they enhance search quality, the data suggests that AI Overviews decrease organic visibility, particularly for publishers who depend greatly on informational traffic.