On October 28, 2026, Google announced that it is expanding ads in AI Mode in Search to ten more countries: Australia, Canada, India, Kenya, Malaysia, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines, and Singapore. Brazil, Mexico, and the United Kingdom are to follow in the fourth quarter. Germany, Austria, and Switzerland are on neither list.
You can already use AI Mode itself in German here. Sponsored listings within the AI answers, however, are so far only shown by Google in English, as the Google Ads Help lists.
Where do the ads appear now?
In the new countries, text and Shopping ads can appear directly in AI Mode answers, labeled as advertising. In the US, Google also displays ads for follow-up questions in the ongoing dialogue. In the German-speaking region, the situation looks like this:
Placement
USA and new countries
Germany, Austria, Switzerland
above and below the AI Overview
yes
yes
in the AI Overview and in AI Mode
yes, in English
no
for follow-up questions in AI Mode
USA only
no
Google justifies the move with figures from the US: queries in AI Mode are on average three times as long as classic search queries, and sponsored product listings there are clicked about as often as unpaid ones. The announcement came on the day of the quarterly results. According to TechCrunch, search revenue grew by 12 percent in the third quarter, after 17 percent in the second.
How do your ads get into the AI answers?
You don't need a separate campaign for this. Existing Search, Shopping, and Performance Max campaigns automatically take part in the auction, and billing works as with any search ad.
The keyword option determines reach. With "Broad match," AI Max for Search campaigns, Shopping, and Performance Max, Google can display an ad even when only the AI answer reveals purchase interest. Google gives as an example the question of why a pool is green: the answer mentions algae treatments and pool vacuums, and ads matching those are then shown. Keywords with "Exact match" or "Phrase match" only take effect once the search query itself asks for a product.
The placement cannot be specifically booked or opted out of, but negative keywords and brand exclusions still apply. Google does not offer a separate report: clicks from the AI answers are included in the usual campaign reports in aggregated form. In addition, Google places short explanatory texts next to some ads, which Gemini writes from the search query, the AI answer, and public sources such as your website. You cannot edit or turn them off.
What this means for you
If you only run ads for Germany, Austria, or Switzerland, nothing changes for the time being. Google does not name a date for the German-speaking region.
If you address customers in Canada, Australia, or, during the fourth quarter, in the United Kingdom with ads, take a look at the keyword options of those campaigns. With broad match keywords or Performance Max, your ads can already appear in the AI answers there. Therefore, set your budget and negative keywords deliberately.
Keep the texts on your website up to date, because Google can use them for the explanatory texts next to your ads.
Sort your keywords by option now, so that when the launch in the German-speaking region comes, you know which campaigns are served broadly. How to define keywords and target groups is shown in the lesson on Google Ads keywords in the Paid Ads tutorial.
According to Google, ads have no influence on the unpaid AI answers. How to get mentioned there is covered in the course on visibility in ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini.
Google announced the expansion on October 28, 2026, on the Google Ads blog.
