You keep hearing that you need to be “visible in AI”, but nobody can tell you which numbers are real. This guide is for business owners and marketers who run their own site and want a straight answer. After reading it you’ll know which AI visibility metrics Google itself provides, where to find them in Google Search Console, how to read them next to your normal search data, and which questions nobody can answer yet.

You’ll need access to a verified Google Search Console property for your site. If you haven’t verified one, do that first.

Step 1: Open the Generative AI performance report

Google introduced the Search Generative AI performance reports on 3 June 2026. As of 31 August 2026 they’ve rolled out to all websites worldwide^[1][2]. They cover AI Overviews and AI Mode in Google Search. Discover has its own separate report^[1][2].

1. Sign in to Google Search Console.
2. Look for the Generative AI performance report. Google’s help page for it is listed in the sources^[2].
3. Click it. You’ll see a chart at the top and tables below.

If you can’t find it, don’t assume something is broken. Google says the report usually doesn’t appear for one of two reasons: the site hasn’t had enough impressions in generative AI features yet, or the site has been excluded from them^[2].

If the report is missing

Work through the two causes in order.

• Not enough impressions. A small or new site may not have reached the point where Google has data to show.
• Site excluded. To be eligible for display, a site must be included in Search generative AI features in Search Console^[3]. Check your settings there and confirm nobody on your team opted the site out. If you work with a developer or agency, ask them directly.

Step 2: Read the AI visibility metrics Google gives you

The report is built around one metric: impressions. An impression here means a link to your site was shown in a generative AI feature^[1][2]. You can break it down by:

• Page: which URLs were shown
• Country: where the people seeing them were
• Device: the type of device they used
• Date: day by day, with dates in Pacific Time^[1][2]

Use the search type filter

There’s a Search type filter with two options: Web text-based and Web multimodal^[2]. Switch between them to see whether your pages appear in one more than the other.

Search Labs experiments are not included in this data^[2]. If you’ve seen your site in a Labs feature, it won’t be counted here.

What to look for

1. Sort by impressions. These are the pages Google is showing in AI features.
2. Ask whether they’re the pages you’d choose.
3. Check that your main market appears near the top.

Don’t read the numbers as a score. They’re counts of appearances. Impressions say you were present, not that anyone acted. Next, compare your top pages with your main Performance report.

Step 3: Compare it with the main Performance report

Google says the same data is also in the overall Performance report, under the Web search type^[2]. Set the two side by side to put AI appearances in the context of your wider search presence.

1. In Google Search Console, open Performance, then Search results.
2. Make sure the Search type is Web.
3. Use the same date range, country and device filters you used in the generative AI report.
4. Compare the pages that appear in both.

Don’t expect the totals to match exactly. Google notes several quirks^[2]:

• Chart totals can differ from table totals because of how the data is aggregated.
• The usual 1,000 row limit applies to the tables, so a large site won’t see every page.
• Dates are in Pacific Time, which may put an impression on a different calendar day than you expect in London.

The report has an export button^[2]. If you have more than 1,000 pages or want to filter in a spreadsheet, export early and work from the file. To get past the row limit, filter by country, device or search type and export each slice separately. That’s a practical workaround, not a Google instruction, so check the totals as you go.

What the report does not show

This is the part most vendors skip. Google’s report shows impressions of links to your site, and that’s all. Specifically:

• No clicks. The report counts links being shown, not people clicking them^[2].
• No queries. You can’t see which questions triggered your appearance^[2].
• No Gemini app answers. The report covers AI Overviews and AI Mode in Google Search^[1][2]. What the Gemini app says about your brand isn’t in it.
• No other AI tools. ChatGPT, Claude and other assistants aren’t covered either.
• No Search Labs experiments^[2].

Treat any single score you’re sold as the vendor’s own method, and ask how it’s built before you use it.

Other ways to track AI visibility

You’ll see plenty of third-party tools that promise AI visibility metrics. Google’s guide says to be wary of tools that promise ranking success or claim internal Google metrics, because no third-party tool has access to Google’s internal ranking or AI systems^[3].

Our view, and it’s an opinion rather than Google guidance: tools that ask AI assistants a set list of questions and record the answers produce samples, not a full count. AI answers can vary by person, wording and moment, so a tool shows what happened when it asked, not what happened for your customers. Ask any tool how it samples: how many questions, how often, from which locations, and how it handles answers that change between runs.

If you want to run your own check, keep it simple:

1. Write 10 to 20 questions a real customer would ask about your products or services.
2. Ask them in the tools your customers use, including Gemini.
3. Record whether your brand is mentioned, how it’s described and which sources are linked.
4. Repeat monthly, using the same wording, and treat the results as a sample.

Treat the output as notes, not metrics. It can show you wrong descriptions or missing facts on your site that you can fix. It can’t give you a number for a board report.

Merchant Center free listings and Gemini

If you sell products, there’s one more official signal. Google’s page on free listings for products lists Gemini among the places your products can appear at no cost, and says display is not guaranteed^[4]. That’s eligibility, not a promise. It doesn’t mean Gemini will show you.

Common mistakes to avoid

• Treating impressions as visits. They’re appearances, not traffic.
• Assuming a missing report means failure. It usually means too few impressions or an exclusion^[2].
• Comparing totals without checking filters. Match the search type, dates, country and device first.
• Ignoring Pacific Time. Daily numbers may sit a day off from your local calendar.
• Buying a score you can’t audit. If a vendor can’t explain its sampling, you can’t judge the number.
• Optimising for a tool, not for people. Google’s guide on optimising for generative AI features is the place to start^[3].

The practice of optimising for these features is also called GEO (generative engine optimisation). Whatever name it carries, the data you can trust starts with what Google reports and ends where Google’s report ends.

Export your first report this week, save it with the date and decide what you’ll compare it with next month. If you want help reading the numbers or fixing what they reveal, see our work on AI visibility at https://oxfordimpulse.com/ai-visibility/ .

FAQs

Sources

• Google Search Central Blog: Introducing Search Generative AI performance reports in Search Console developers.google.com
• Search Console Help: Generative AI performance report (Search) support.google.com
• Google Search Central: Optimizing your website for generative AI features on Google Search developers.google.com
• Google Merchant Center Help: Free listings for products support.google.com