Should you opt out of Google AI Overviews? A UK guide

Google now lets every website owner keep their site out of the answers its AI writes in search results. Those answers are AI Overviews (the AI-written summary that often sits at the top of Google's results) and AI Mode (a chat-style way of searching Google). The switch is called the Search generative AI control. It sits in Google Search Console, Google's free tool for website owners. Google says it was rolled out to all websites worldwide by 31 August 2026. On 21 October, Google added it to its official list of ways to control what you share with Google Search, next to older tools. The switch exists because of a ruling by a UK regulator. For a small business, the real question is whether you should use it.

What changed?

On 3 June 2026, the Competition and Markets Authority (the CMA, the UK body that makes sure big companies compete fairly) placed new rules on Google's search business. It calls them a publisher conduct requirement, and it described them as a world first. Under these rules:

• Google must let publishers (people who put content online, such as news sites) stop their content being used to power AI features in Search, such as AI Overviews.
• When AI answers use someone's content, Google must say where it came from, with clear links.
• Google has nine months to make all the changes, and must publish reports on how it is keeping to the rules every six months during the first year.

Google's answer is one switch. According to Google's help page, if you switch your site off:

• it is removed from AI Overviews, AI Mode and the AI features in Google Discover (the news feed in the Google app);
• your pages will not be linked to from those features, so you get no visits from them, and your site is not shown there at all;
• the change happens within one to two days, though some pages Google has stored can take longer.

Google also says the switch "isn't used as a ranking or inclusion signal affecting other parts of Search". In plain English, turning it off should not move you up or down in Google's normal list of results. The CMA's final decision goes further. It bans Google from pushing a website lower in its normal results because the owner has opted out.

What does the switch not do?

This is where many owners get confused. Google has two separate AI settings that do different jobs.

• The Search generative AI control (in Search Console) decides whether your site appears in AI Overviews and AI Mode. It does not affect AI training (how AI systems learn from what is written online).
• Google-Extended is a line that can be added to a small instructions file on your website, called robots.txt, which tells Google's systems what they may do. It decides whether Google can use your content to train future versions of its Gemini AI, and whether some Google products outside Search can use your pages as a source for their answers. Google's own technical guide says Google-Extended "does not impact a site's inclusion in Google Search", so it has no effect on whether you show up in Google. Google's help page for the new switch says the switch, not Google-Extended, controls AI Overviews and AI Mode, and that it "doesn't affect AI training".

So blocking Google-Extended will not keep you out of AI Overviews. And turning off the Search Console switch will not stop Google using your content to train its AI. If you want both, you need to do both.

The switch also does not change anything you have set up in Merchant Center (Google's tool for listing products) or Google Ads. And for now it works on your whole website at once, not page by page. Search Engine Journal reports that page-by-page controls are due by March 2027 under the CMA's timetable.

Does this affect my business website?

It affects every website, because every site is included unless its owner says otherwise. If you have done nothing, you can appear in AI Overviews and AI Mode, and you have lost nothing.

The CMA designed this for news organisations and other publishers. They argue that AI answers sum up their articles and leave readers no reason to click. That argument makes sense when the writing is the thing you sell.

For most small businesses, the writing is not the thing you sell. A roofer, a dentist or an accountant does not earn money when someone reads their web page. They earn money when someone calls. If a person asks Google "who fits flat roofs near Plymouth" and the AI answer names your business and links to it, that is a possible new customer. If you have opted out, you are not in that answer, and a competitor probably is.

It is also hard to measure. Search Console has a new generative AI performance report. It tells you how often links to your site were shown in AI Overviews and AI Mode, broken down by page, country, device and date. It does not show how many people clicked, or what they searched for. Search Engine Journal reports that the CMA expects Google to provide click figures, mostly from December. Until then, nobody can see from Google's own tools how many visitors AI answers send to a website.

So opting out now would mean giving up a way of being seen before you can measure what it is worth.

Who might sensibly opt out?

It can make sense for:

• websites that make money from adverts or paid subscriptions on their articles, where an AI summary can replace the visit;
• websites whose main value is detailed guides, recipes or reference information that an AI answer can repeat in full;
• businesses with a specific legal or contract reason not to have their words summed up by someone else.

Even then, test with real numbers first. You can switch the setting back in Search Console, but Google's help page does not say how quickly a site gets its place in AI answers back.

What should I do now?

Checking whether your business appears in Google and AI answers each month is part of our monthly plans, but the steps above work whoever does them.

Is it worth staying in AI answers?

The CMA ruling gives website owners a real choice for the first time. That is good. But a choice is not an instruction. For news sites, opting out is a way to bargain with Google. For a local business, AI Overviews and AI Mode are more and more where people ask who to call. Staying visible there, and making your website clear enough to be quoted correctly, is likely to matter more over the next year than keeping AI out.

If you want help checking how your business shows up in Google's AI answers, call us on 01752 741969.

Sources

1. Search generative AI control (Search Console Help)
2. Generative AI performance report (Search Console Help)
3. Control what you share with Google Search
4. Latest Google Search documentation updates
5. CMA secures fairer deal for publishers and improves Google search services in UK
6. CMA Publisher Conduct Requirement final decision, 3 June 2026
7. What Opting Out Of Google's AI Search Features Means Now (Search Engine Journal)
8. Google common crawlers: Google-Extended