#SearchEngineWatch

Google says AI Mode's lower monetization helped slow Search revenue growth, even as AI features encouraged people to ask more questions in search.

Microsoft makes Conversions API generally available to connect sales records with ad reports, with matching IDs and consent settings to check first.

Mistral releases its largest AI model for self-hosting, with commercial use allowed and a separate license required for certain model service businesses.

Reddit is rolling out separate For You and Following feeds globally, letting you stick to communities you joined and return to your preferred feed.

Anthropic found that experts followed AI advice with randomly assigned preferences in 86% of analytical choices, testing who shapes their conclusions.

OpenAI’s new visual ad format for ChatGPT is now showing in chats, with multiple images, bold text, a ‘Learn more’ button, and an ‘Ad’ label.

Google’s new help doc says AI review summaries in search ads are positive only, meaning a business with poor reviews could still get a glowing summary.

Google Tag Manager’s Preview mode now has an ‘Enable verbose logging’ option that shows Google tag logs in Tag Assistant’s Console tab, though logs can’t yet be exported or filtered.

Google is testing query bubbles at the top of AI Overviews in some languages, and clicking one opens AI Mode with the bubble text as the prompt,

Google is expanding AI Mode ads to 10 additional countries, including India, Canada and Australia, while launching multiturn ads in the US. Brazil, Mexico and the UK are expected to follow in Q4 2026.