What happened: On September 21, 2026, Gagan Ghotra spotted Google testing AI Overview links that do not open a website at all. They open AI Mode instead. He posted screen recordings on X: “in AI Overviews answers Google is now testing showing anchor links which instead of taking to a webpage takes to AI Mode,” and called it “Another Tactic from Google to push users from usual search results to AI Mode.” The links sit at the bottom of the AI Overview and read like follow-up questions. Google has not commented.
Source(s): Search Engine Roundtable documented the test with Ghotra’s images. Background on how Google positions these surfaces is in Google’s Search blog.
Why AI Overview links to AI Mode matter
Until now the argument about AI Overviews was about position. Your citation was there, it was just smaller and lower than a blue link. This test changes the destination. An anchor inside the answer looks like every other link on the page, but the click never leaves Google. The user lands in AI Mode with a fresh generated answer, and your page is one step further away than it was before the click.
The timing matters too. Publisher-level attribution in AI Mode already changed on August 31, 2026, when citations started routing through Google’s own search viewer rather than straight to publisher URLs. Now some AI Overview links point into AI Mode as well. Two steps in the same direction inside four weeks.
What this does to SaaS traffic
SaaS sites live on a small set of high-intent queries: “best X software”, “X vs Y”, “X alternatives”, “X pricing”. Those are exactly the queries where an AI Overview shows up with a long answer and a row of follow-up prompts underneath.
| Click path | Before | With AI Overview links to AI Mode |
|---|---|---|
| Where the click goes | Your page | AI Mode, still on Google |
| What you get | A session, a signup chance | An impression, no session |
| Search Console | Click recorded | No click recorded for you |
| What the user sees next | Your pricing or comparison page | Another generated answer |
| Your lever | Title, snippet, position | Being cited, and being the brand named in the answer |
The reporting gap is the part teams miss. An impression with no click looks identical to a bad title tag in Search Console. If AI Overview links are eating the click, rewriting the title will do nothing, and you will spend a month testing snippets for no reason.
What to do
- Check your top 20 money queries by hand. Run them logged out and look at the bottom of the AI Overview. If the anchors open AI Mode instead of a site, write down the date and the query. That list is your exposure.
- Split impressions from clicks in your reporting. Track impressions, clicks and CTR per query, not sitewide averages. Flat impressions with falling CTR on AI-heavy queries is the pattern to watch. Our walkthrough of measuring SaaS SEO in GA4 and GSC sets this up.
- Get named, not just cited. When the click stays on Google, the win is the model repeating your product name with the right description. Clear positioning lines, real pricing on the page and comparison tables help more than another 500 words. We covered this in our guide to AI Overviews visibility for SaaS.
- Shift some demand off search. Newsletter, community, review sites, docs that people bookmark. A channel that does not depend on AI Overview links is worth more every month this trend continues.
None of this is a reason to stop publishing. It is a reason to stop counting rankings as the outcome. We saw the same shift when People Also Ask answers turned into AI Overviews.
Quick recap: AI Overview links
- Google is testing AI Overview links that open AI Mode instead of a website, spotted September 21, 2026.
- Gagan Ghotra reported it on X; Google has said nothing so far.
- These AI Overview links sit at the bottom of the answer and read like follow-up questions.
- It follows the August 31, 2026 change that routed AI Mode citations through Google’s search viewer.
- For SaaS teams, AI Overview links mean impressions without sessions on high-intent queries.
- Check your money queries by hand, watch CTR per query, and work on being named inside the answer.
