August 2026 — SEO, AEO & GEO news.

What changed, as it happens.

Tracked daily from primary sources. The items below are what we're watching for clients right now.

1. Aug 1, 2026AI Search · Search Console

   The AI opt-out switch is reaching US accounts, and nobody has the data to use it

   Google's "Search generative AI" control, which lives in Search Console's settings, began appearing on some US accounts in July 2026 after previously being required only in the UK. It governs links and grounding in AI Overviews, AI Mode, and Discover's generative AI features. Google says it does not affect regular Search rankings, Merchant Center, Google Ads participation, or AI training, which has separate controls of its own. Changes take a few days to process, and content drops out within one to two days once they do, with caching able to delay it further. The control exists because the UK Competition and Markets Authority imposed a conduct requirement on Google in June 2026; the same CMA timeline calls for click data and click-through rates by December 2026 and page-level controls by March 2027. Running alongside that, NewzDash tracking puts Top Stories carousels inside AI Overviews on 15.5% of US trending-news queries and 17.46% of UK ones, which means the opt-out can remove a site from both placements in one move. There is still no click or conversion data published for AI Overviews, so nobody can measure what opting out costs them.Source: Search Engine Journal →

   Our take: For a store this is a switch to leave alone. It does not touch your rankings, but it pulls your links out of AI Overviews and AI Mode, which sit on close to half of Google searches. The publishers weighing it up have a traffic grievance a catalog does not have, and the click data that would settle the question is not due until December.

   Read our full take →