Google tests hiding AI Mode from search bar and AI Overviews

What is changing in the tests

Google appears to be running a test that hides two of its most visible AI features. According to Search Engine Roundtable, the AI Mode tab that normally sits in the search tab bar at the top of the results page has disappeared for some users. A follow-up box labelled Ask anything, which appears at the bottom of AI Overviews, is also being removed in the same test.

AI Mode is Google's conversational search feature, and AI Overviews are the short AI-written summaries shown above some results. Both sit in prominent positions, so their absence is easy for regular users to notice.

How the change was spotted

Search marketer Glenn Gabe saw the change and shared screenshots on X. He noted that Google was not showing the Ask anything box within an AI Overview, and then realised the AI Mode tab had also vanished from the search results page.

This follows earlier reports from Search Engine Roundtable that Google had removed the AI Mode buttons from the Google homepage. A screenshot from ten days before the latest report already showed AI Mode missing from the homepage, so the latest test extends that pattern to the results page itself.

Why Google might be scaling back

Some observers suspect the test relates to money. Ads shown in AI Mode are said to earn less than ads in traditional search results, and that shortfall has been named as one reason for a weak earnings quarter.

There is, however, a simpler explanation. Google regularly runs experiments in which certain features are hidden from a subset of users, and it has done so for many years. Without confirmation from the company, it is not possible to say whether this test points to a permanent removal.

What it means for searchers

For most people the change, if it reaches them, would make the results page look more like it did before the AI push. The conversational entry points would be gone, but the underlying features may still exist for users in other test groups.

Anyone affected who wants the feature back has little to do but wait, as Google tests typically rotate on their own. Search Engine Roundtable notes the situation is a test, not an announced policy change, so the interface could return at any time.