Can you turn off Google AI Overviews? No — but the Web filter hides them

The short version

• You cannot turn off Google AI Overviews. Google says "Features cannot be turned off." They are, in its words, a core feature "like knowledge panels".
• The Web filter hides them, one search at a time. Google: "This filter displays only text-based links without features like AI Overviews."
• AI Mode is something you open, not something that opens on you. You go to it; if you do not, you are not in it.
• Turning off “AI in Search” in Labs is not the off switch people hope it is. It is about Google’s experiments, not the AI Overviews everyone sees.
• You can stop your future searches being used to improve Google’s AI by turning off history, which is a different thing from hiding the answers.
• If you run a website, there is no AI-only opt-out yet: the controls Google lists today limit your ordinary search result too. That is changing in the UK, where the competition regulator has required Google to provide one by 3 December 2026.

Can you turn off Google AI Overviews?

No. Google’s help page on AI Overviews in Google Search says so in two sentences, under a heading about showing only web links:

“AI Overviews are a core Google Search feature, like knowledge panels. Features cannot be turned off. However, you can select the Web filter after you perform a search. This filter displays only text-based links without features like AI Overviews.”

That is the whole answer, and it is more candid than most of what you will find by searching for it. There is no setting in your Google account that makes them stop. The rest of this post is about what you can do instead.

One date to keep in mind. When we read these pages on 24 September 2026, and again on 26 September, each one opened with a notice that Google is "currently updating settings for Google Search services" and that the settings described "may not match your current experience". We checked what those new settings are: they cover search history and personalised recommendations, not an AI Overviews switch. If that changes, the answer above will change with it.

How to use the Web filter to hide AI Overviews

1. Search as normal.
2. Look at the row of filters just below the search bar.
3. Choose Web. If it is not showing, Google suggests using the “All” option to see the other filters.

Google’s own page on refining searches explains why it moves about: "The exact filters and the order in which they appear is dynamic." And it describes what you get:

“The "Web" filter contains text-based links to websites.”

The honest limitation is in Google’s own wording: you select it "after you perform a search". It is a filter per search, not a preference that sticks. People do use browser extensions and hand-built search links to make it stick; those are unofficial, Google does not document them, and we have not tested any of them, so we are not recommending one.

What about Google AI Mode?

AI Mode is a separate, chat-style experience rather than a box at the top of your normal results. Google lists three ways in: "Go to google.com/ai", tap AI Mode after entering a question in the search bar, or tap it on the Google app’s home screen. Every one of those is something you choose to do.

Google’s page describes how to use it and where it is available; it does not describe a way to remove it, and we will not invent one. The practical answer to “how do I turn off AI Mode” is that you are only in it if you went there. If you have ended up in it, go back to an ordinary search.

The switch that is not an off switch

The same AI Overviews page has a section headed Turn off "AI in Search" in Labs, which is where a lot of people think they have found the answer. Read the paragraph above it: it is about trying "new AI features, experiments, and ideas in Search" early, and it says "To opt-out, turn off “AI in Search” in Labs." That opts you out of the experiments. It does not remove the AI Overviews that appear in ordinary results, which Google says "cannot be turned off" two headings earlier.

What you can control: whether your searches train Google’s AI

If what bothers you is less the answers and more the data, there is a real setting. Google says:

“If you don’t want the future searches you do while signed in to your Google Account to be used to improve the quality of Search’s generative AI models, you can turn off history settings in My Activity. This will stop future Search history from being saved to your Google account.”

Two caveats, both Google’s own. It adds "Google may still use aggregated, anonymized search data", and those history settings are being replaced by two new ones: the new Search services settings page says they are rolling out "gradually over the next few months".

And if you run a website

The other half of this question comes from business owners who would rather their pages were not summarised in an AI Overview at all. Google’s page for site owners, AI features and your website, is clear that there is nothing special to opt into: "There are no additional requirements to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, nor other special optimizations necessary." A page is eligible if it is "indexed and eligible to be shown in Google Search with a snippet".

And, for now, there is nothing special to opt out with either. The controls Google points to are the ordinary ones:

“To limit the information shown from your pages in Search, use nosnippet, data-nosnippet, max-snippet, or noindex controls.”

That is the number under the number: today there is no AI-only switch. Every one of those controls also limits how your page appears in normal results; noindex removes it altogether. For most small businesses, being quoted in an AI answer with a link is better than not being there, and a better tool is on its way, so we would think hard before using any of them now. If you want to know whether it is happening, Google says AI feature traffic is counted with the rest of your search traffic in Search Console, and we have written up how to track AI Overview traffic separately.

The UK regulator has required an AI-only opt-out

That is about to change for UK sites. On 3 June 2026 the Competition and Markets Authority imposed what it calls a publisher conduct requirement on Google, under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024. It defines a publisher as "any party that makes content available on the web", so it covers a small business website as much as a newspaper. The core of it, from the CMA’s notice:

“Google shall provide publishers with effective controls to withhold their Search Content from being used in generative AI services and features.”

The notice names the features it means, "such as AI Overviews and AI Mode", and says the controls must work at "directory-level" and "page-level". Google must not punish anyone for using them, "for example by downranking their Search Content". It covers what is "shown to any natural or legal persons located in the UK". It is about what websites can withhold, not what searchers see: it gives nobody an off switch for AI Overviews.

And the date, from the CMA’s one-page summary:

“Google has until 3 December 2026 to comply with the CR, with an additional 3 months to develop and roll-out a page level control.”

The same summary says "Google is already rolling out parts of the control and elements of enhanced transparency", without saying which parts. We looked on 25 September 2026, and again on 26 September, and found no AI Overviews-only control in Google’s own documentation yet: the site-owner page still lists only the controls quoted above, and Google’s crawler page says its separate Google-Extended setting "does not impact a site's inclusion in Google Search". So the practical advice for a UK site owner is to wait. If you want out of AI Overviews but not out of Google, the tool built for exactly that is due by 3 December, page by page three months later, and nosnippet or noindex now would cost you your ordinary listing in the meantime.

What argues the other way

• Settings are moving. Google says its Search settings are being updated over the coming months. We read these pages on 24 and 26 September 2026; check the date before relying on this.
• A deadline is not a delivery. The CMA can enforce its requirement, but nobody will know what Google’s control looks like, or how well it works, until it arrives. We will add a dated note to this post when it does.
• AI Overviews are sometimes useful. They are also, by Google’s own account, fallible: "AI Overviews can and will make mistakes." If you use them, click through to the sources for anything that matters.
• We are an AI company. We build AI agents, and this post was written by one, so we are not neutral about AI. On this question we have simply quoted Google and left the choice with you.

Sources, and what we checked

• Google Search Help: Find information in faster & easier ways with AI Overviews in Google Search, Get AI-powered responses with AI Mode in Google Search, Refine Google searches and Get started with Search Services History & Personalized Recommendations. Links taken from Google’s own help pages.
• Google Search Central: AI features and your website, last updated 10 December 2025, and Google’s common crawlers page (Google-Extended), last updated 14 July 2026.
• Competition and Markets Authority: the Publisher Conduct Requirement notice (3 June 2026), the publisher conduct requirement summary (3 August 2026) and the press release (3 June 2026). Links taken from the CMA’s Google search case page.
• Google’s help pages were fetched raw on 24 September 2026, and the CMA documents and Google’s crawler page on 25 September 2026. Every source was fetched again on 26 September 2026, the day of publication, and none had changed: Google’s pages were identical once stripped of page furniture, and the CMA’s PDFs were byte-for-byte identical. Every quotation above was tested automatically against the stripped source text before publication.