Google adds link carousels for developing topics in AI Mode

Google is rolling out link carousels for developing topics, like top stories, for AI Mode after adding this feature for AI Overviews within Google Search earlier.

What it looks like. Here is a screenshot of these link carousels within the AI Mode results:

More clickable. This should make the AI Mode results more click-friendly, meaning, it should lead to more clicks than you saw before from AI Mode. Of course, it is hard to know how many clicks you received from AI Mode because Google does not report on click data in Search Console’s generative AI reports.

And, of course, the clicks won’t be as high as they were before Google added AI Overviews or AI Mode to Google Search. But it should help increase the clicks you get from AI Mode, nevertheless.

What Google said. Robby Stein from Google said:

• “Now live in AI Mode (already in AI Overviews): link carousels for developing topics. Ask about something that’s trending and you’ll see links to relevant articles, webpages (incl your Preferred Sources) front & center.”
• “Our goal with AI Search is to make it easy to connect with original coverage and a range of perspectives.”

Why we care. While this is an improvement in the clickability of links within AI Mode, you should not expect to see the same level of clicks you received from Google Search pre-AI search integration. Clicks from the pre-AI days are gone and we need to adapt to this new world of fewer clicks and more just searchers reading, maybe doing a follow up query, and then leaving Google Search.

Of course, we can be hopeful that Google will add even more clickable elements to Google’s AI search features.