Classic results, AI Overviews, AI Mode and Discover: the surfaces of Google Search

The results page is many surfaces, not ten blue links

Google calls the parts of a results page visual elements: “Visual elements are the building blocks of the Google Search results page that a user can perceive or interact with.” Its Visual Elements gallery groups the most common ones into five types:

• Text result. “A result in Google Search that's based on the textual content of the page.”
• Rich result. “A result that typically relies on structured data in the markup of your page to display graphical elements or interactive experiences.”
• Image result. Based on an image embedded on a page. “An image result is more likely to show for image-seeking queries.”
• Video result. Based on a video embedded on a page. “A video result is more likely to show for video-seeking queries.”
• Exploration features. “A feature that helps searchers expand and refine their initial search.” People also ask and related searches belong here.

On top of these sit the AI features (AI Overviews on the results page and AI Mode as its own experience), Top stories for news queries, and, outside the results page entirely, the Discover feed. One URL can appear in several of them at once: as a text result, as the source of a featured snippet, as a supporting link in an AI Overview and as a card in someone's Discover feed. They all start from the same index, which is why the basics of crawling and indexing, covered in the lesson From crawl to ranking: the full pipeline, come first.

Paid results: Google Ads and the ad auction

Not everything on the results page is earned. Above and below the organic results Google can show ads from Google Ads, labelled as sponsored. Advertisers bid on keywords, and for every search Google runs an auction to decide which ads appear and in what order.

The highest bid does not automatically win. In Google's words, “It's not like an art auction where the highest bidder always wins”. Position is decided by Ad Rank, which Google calculates from several factors:

• the bid (the maximum the advertiser will pay for a click);
• the quality of the ad and of the landing page;
• Ad Rank thresholds and how competitive the auction is;
• the context of the search: location, device, time, the query itself and what else is on the page;
• the expected impact of assets and other ad formats.

That is why a cheaper bid can still sit higher: “So, even if your competition has higher bids than yours, you can still win a higher position at a lower price by using highly relevant keywords and ads.” The auction is also not a single event per page: “When someone searches on Google, we run different auctions for each ad location.” Top ads and ads lower on the page are chosen separately, and the result can change from one search to the next.

Ads do not buy organic rankings

Paid and organic results are separate systems. Google states it plainly: “Google doesn't accept payment to rank pages higher, and ranking is done programmatically.” Running ads does not lift your organic positions, and pausing them does not hurt them. Ad clicks are reported in Google Ads; the Search Console Performance report covers only unpaid search results.

What ads mean for SEO work

• Less room above the fold. On commercial queries several ads can push the first organic result down, so a high position brings fewer clicks than on a query without ads. Check the live results page before you estimate traffic from a ranking.
• Shared data. The Google Ads search terms report shows real queries and conversion rates. It is a fast way to test which keywords are worth an organic page.
• The same landing page standards. A clear, fast, relevant landing page helps both: it feeds ad quality and it is what organic search rewards.
• Brand queries. Competitors can bid on your brand name. Whether to defend it with your own ads is a business decision; it does not change your organic result.

Classic text results

The text result is still the backbone of the page. Google's definition: “A text result (formerly known as a "web result" or "plain blue link") is a result in Google Search that's based on the textual content of the page.” It is built from smaller parts:

• Attribution: favicon, site name and visible URL (domain plus breadcrumb trail).
• Title link: the clickable headline. Google usually builds it from your <title> and headings, but it can rewrite it.
• Snippet: the description under the title, usually taken from the page text or your meta description.
• Byline date: “The date that Google estimates the web page was updated or published.”
• Sitelinks: extra links to other pages or sections of the same site. “While sitelinks are automated, there are some best practices you can follow for improving the quality.”

Not every element appears every time. “You won't see a text result that includes all of the possible visual elements.” A page qualifies for a text result simply by being indexed and eligible to be shown. You influence the title link, the snippet and the site name through your own HTML; you do not switch sitelinks on or off, they follow from a clear structure and good internal links. The lessons Title tags and Meta descriptions and snippets go into detail.

Rich results and other SERP features

Rich results are text results with extra visual information: review stars, prices and availability, recipe times, event dates, breadcrumbs. Google's search gallery explains the link to markup: “Google uses structured data to understand the content on the page and show that content in a richer appearance in search results, which is called a rich result.” The extra lines are called rich attributes, and “This information is typically powered by structured data, provided by you.”

Valid markup makes a page eligible for a rich result, not entitled to one. Google decides whether to show it for a particular query. Which types exist, which still display and how to implement them is the subject of the lesson Structured data in 2026; for now, remember that markup has to describe what is visibly on the page.

Exploration features: People also ask and related searches

The related questions group (People also ask) is a list of questions that expand into answers. “When a user expands the question, they're shown a featured snippet.” The related searches group links to new searches built from what other people searched. You cannot place your page in either directly, but Google suggests using them for research: “While you can't control what shows up here, it can be helpful to pay attention to the related search queries when you're thinking about topics you could write about for your site.”

Featured snippets

“Featured snippets are special boxes where the format of a regular search result is reversed, showing the descriptive snippet first.” They can sit at the top of the page or inside People also ask. In Search Console, a featured snippet usually counts as the top result: “For example, a featured snippet has a link to the source property, and so it (typically) occupies position 1.”

There is no tag that makes a page a featured snippet. Google's own question and answer: “How can I mark my page as a featured snippet?” “You can't. Google systems determine whether a page would make a good featured snippet for a user's search request, and if so, elevates it.” When someone clicks, “Clicking a featured snippet takes the user directly to the section of the page that appeared in the featured snippet.” Google does that scrolling itself, with no extra markup on your side.

Opting out is possible. nosnippet removes all snippets: “To block all snippets (including featured snippets and regular snippets) from appearing for a given page, add the nosnippet rule to that page.” The data-nosnippet attribute hides only the parts of the text you mark. To keep normal snippets but avoid featured ones, lower max-snippet: “In general, the shorter your max-snippet rule setting, the less likely the page will appear as a featured snippet.” There is no fixed threshold, because “Google does not provide an exact minimum length required to appear as a featured snippet.” “If you need a guaranteed solution, use the nosnippet rule.” How to structure content that wins these boxes is covered in Featured snippets, lists and tables.

AI Overviews

An AI Overview is a generated summary at the top of the results with links to the pages that support it. Google describes the purpose: “AI Overviews help people get to the gist of a complicated topic or question more quickly, and provide a jumping off point to explore links to learn more.”

They do not appear for every query: “AI Overviews are only shown when our systems determine that it is additive to classic Search, and as such, often don't trigger.” Navigational searches for a brand or a simple fact often show no AI Overview at all, while broad or multi-part questions often do.

To build the answer, AI Overviews and AI Mode may use a technique Google calls query fan-out, “issuing multiple related searches across subtopics and data sources”. In practice a page can be cited for a broad question because it answers one of the sub-questions well. The supporting links are ordinary indexed pages; there is no separate AI index you submit to.

AI Mode

AI Mode is a separate, conversational way to search. You open it as its own mode, ask a question and keep asking follow-ups. “AI Mode is particularly helpful for queries where further exploration, reasoning, or complex comparisons are needed.” Answers include links to supporting websites, much as AI Overviews do.

Do not expect the two features to cite the same pages. “AI Mode and AI Overviews may use different models and techniques, so the set of responses and links they show will vary.” A follow-up question is treated as a fresh search, which matters when you read the data in Search Console later in this lesson.

What Google officially says about appearing in AI features

Google's documentation for site owners is short and clear. It is worth quoting in full because a lot of advice on the web contradicts it.

Two more statements answer the most common questions directly:

• “You don't need to create new machine readable files, AI text files, or markup to appear in these features.”
• “There's also no special schema.org structured data that you need to add.”

Eligibility is still not a promise: “Indexing and serving isn't guaranteed.” The practical reading is that an AI Overview citation is earned the same way as a good classic ranking: crawlable pages, important content in text form, helpful content, and structured data that matches the visible page. The snippet condition is the one technical point to remember: a page with nosnippet cannot be a supporting link. How to shape individual pages so they are easy to cite is the topic of the later lesson Page-level optimisation for AI Overviews and of the module Visibility in AI search.

Discover

Discover is the feed of articles and videos in the Google app and on the Google home page on phones. Nobody types a query; Google picks content that matches each person's interests, based on their activity. Eligibility is automatic: “Content is automatically eligible to appear in Discover if it is indexed by Google and meets Discover's content policies.” “No special tags or structured data are required.” And, as with everything else in Search, “Note that being eligible to appear in Discover is not a guarantee of appearing.”

Google's recommendations focus on honest presentation and good images. Avoid clickbait and sensationalism, and “Use page titles and headlines that capture the essence of the content.” Content that is timely, tells a story well or offers unique insight has the best chance. Discover also leaves some content types out: “For example, Discover might not recommend job applications, petitions, forms, code repositories, or satirical content without any context.”

Image requirements

Large images are what make a Discover card attractive, and Google gives exact specifications. It recommends images that are:

• “At least 1200 px wide”
• “High resolution of more than 300,000 total pixels”
• “16x9 aspect ratio”
• “Enabled by the max-image-preview:large setting, or by using AMP”

Point to the image with og:image or schema.org markup, and choose one that represents the article. Two things to avoid, in Google's words: “Avoid using generic images (for example, your site logo) in the schema.org markup or og:image meta tag.” and “For best results, avoid using text-heavy images in the schema.org markup or og:image meta tag.”

<meta name="robots" content="max-image-preview:large">
<meta property="og:image" content="https://example.com/img/kettle-descaling-1600x900.jpg">

Why Discover traffic goes up and down

Discover follows interests, not searches, so it behaves differently from keyword traffic. Google is direct about it: “Traffic from Discover is less predictable or dependable when compared to keyword-driven search visits.” Interests change, the content mix of the feed changes, and Search updates affect Discover too. Treat it as a bonus on top of search traffic, never as the base of a traffic plan. A site that lives mostly on Discover can lose much of its traffic in a week without having done anything wrong.

Top stories, image and video results

Top stories and the News tab

Google News Help defines the box: “"Top stories" is a section that may appear within Google Search when we detect a search query is news-oriented.” Inclusion is automatic: “Content is automatically selected for this feature.” Markup is optional; Google's Article documentation states “While there's no markup requirement to be eligible for Google News features like Top stories”, adding that Article structured data can describe the content more explicitly. What publishers need is high-quality, timely news content that complies with Google News content policies.

If you ever block the news crawler, know the consequence: “Note that blocking Googlebot-News excludes your content from Google News.” Ordinary Search is not affected by that block. The lesson News and media covers publishers in depth.

Image and video results

Image results and video results show up mostly when the query suggests the person wants a picture or a video, such as "kettle descaling diagram" or "how to descale a kettle video". A page gets there through an image or video that is embedded on an indexed page and can itself be crawled and indexed. Good file names, alt text, a relevant surrounding text and a stable thumbnail are what help. The lessons Images: alt, formats, sizes, lazy loading and Video SEO go through the details.

How each surface is reported in Search Console

There is no separate AI report. Google says that sites in AI features are part of normal search traffic: “In particular, they're reported on in the Performance report, within the "Web" search type.” The Search Console Help page on impressions, position and clicks explains how they are counted:

• AI Overviews. “Clicking a link to an external page in the AI Overview counts as a click.” For position, “An AI Overview occupies a single position in search results, and all links in the AI Overview are assigned that same position.”
• AI Mode. “Clicking a link to an external page in AI Mode counts as a click.” Position follows the normal methodology, and “If a user asks a follow-up question within AI Mode, they are essentially performing a new query.”
• Experiments. “Search Console doesn't include data from experiments in Search Labs, as these experiments are still in active development.”

The practical consequence: you cannot filter AI Overview clicks out of the Web data. You see them blended with everything else, so look at trends per query and page rather than expecting a separate line.

Other surfaces have their own places. Discover has its own Performance report: “This report shows impressions, clicks, and CTR for any of your content that has appeared on Discover in the last 16 months, as long as your data reaches a minimum threshold of impressions.” Google News is separate again: “Data from news.google.com, and from the Google News app on Android and iOS is shown in the Performance report for News.” Inside the Search report you can switch the search type between Web, Image, Video and News (the News tab), and rich result types appear under Search appearance. The lesson Performance report: filters, regex, comparisons shows how to work with these views.

Controls: how to limit what each surface shows

Google's AI features page lists the tools: “To limit the information shown from your pages in Search, use nosnippet, data-nosnippet, max-snippet, or noindex controls.” They are the same controls that work for classic results; there is no separate switch for AI Overviews or AI Mode inside Search. Crawling itself is controlled with robots.txt rules for Googlebot.

Two practical points. First, the rule has to be visible to Googlebot: check it with the URL Inspection tool, which shows the HTML Google received. Second, changes are not instant. Google's advice is to “Allow time for Google to recrawl and process the change in preview controls.” The syntax of every robots rule is in the lesson Meta robots and X-Robots-Tag.

<!-- Keep the page in Search, cap snippets, allow large images -->
<meta name="robots" content="max-snippet:160, max-image-preview:large">

<!-- Hide one block from snippets and AI features -->
<p>Our prices are listed below.</p>
<div data-nosnippet>Member-only discount code details</div>

Why your results look different from your client's

Two people typing the same query rarely see the same page. Google states it plainly: “How the visual elements look can change over time, and a given result can be displayed differently depending on whether you're using a desktop computer or a phone, what country you're in, the language of your search query, and many other factors.” An AI Overview may appear on one phone and not on a laptop in another city; Top stories appears when news breaks and disappears later; a local pack appears for one location and not another.

That is why a single manual search is a poor measure of rankings. Search Console reports average position across all searches, and Google explains the gap you sometimes see: “For your specific search your position might be different than the average because of many variables, such as your search history, location, and so on.” For a fair check, use Search Console data, a rank tracker that queries from a fixed location and device, or at least a private browser window with the right country and language settings.

Common mistakes

• ✕Buying “AI SEO” markup or filesGoogle says no new machine-readable files, AI text files or special schema are needed for AI Overviews or AI Mode.
• ✕Adding nosnippet to fight AI Overviews, then wondering where clicks wentIt removes the snippet from classic results as well. Use data-nosnippet on the specific block if only part of the page is the concern.
• ✕Expecting markup to guarantee a rich resultStructured data makes a page eligible. Google decides whether to show it.
• ✕Using a logo or a text-heavy banner as og:imageBoth are on Google's list of things to avoid for Discover.
• ✕Forgetting max-image-preview:largeGoogle lists it (or AMP) as what enables large Discover images. Without it, the card may get only a small thumbnail.
• ✕Clickbait titles for DiscoverGoogle asks for titles that capture the essence of the content, not ones that exaggerate or withhold.
• ✕Blocking Google-Extended to leave AI OverviewsIt is not a Search control. AI features in Search are limited with the snippet controls and noindex.
• ✕Judging rankings from your own browserDevice, country, language and history all change what you see. Use Search Console and fixed-location tracking.

FAQ

Sources

• Google Ads Help — The ad auction
• Google Ads Help — Ad Rank: definition
• Google Ads Help — About Ad Rank
• Google Search Central — In-depth guide to how Google Search works
• Google Search Central — AI features and your website
• Google Search Central — Visual Elements gallery of Google Search
• Google Search Central — Featured snippets and your website
• Google Search Central — Discover and your website
• Google Search Central — Structured data markup that Google Search supports
• Google Search Central — Article structured data
• Search Console Help — What are impressions, position, and clicks?
• Google News Publisher Center Help — News content across Google

Quotes checked against the official pages on 30 October 2026.