Google Takes AI Mode Ads to 10 More Countries, Including India, and Starts Showing Them in Follow-Up Questions in the US
Google said on October 28 it is scaling ads in AI Mode to Australia, Canada, India, Kenya, Malaysia, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines and Singapore, with Brazil, Mexico and the UK planned for the fourth quarter, and launching multiturn ads in follow-up queries in the US. Its case rests on internal data showing similar click-through rates for sponsored and organic product listings.
Google is putting ads into more AI answers before it has shown advertisers much evidence beyond its own. On October 28 it said it is scaling ads in AI Mode, its conversational search tab, to 10 more countries: Australia, Canada, India, Kenya, Malaysia, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines and Singapore. Brazil, Mexico and the United Kingdom are planned for the fourth quarter.
In the United States, Google is adding multiturn ads, which can appear in follow-up questions rather than only the first query in an AI Mode conversation. Ads will be labelled "Sponsored," wrote Shashi Thakur, who runs Google's search ads.
Google's case, in Google's numbers#
Google's argument rests on two data points from its own research. It says AI Mode queries are on average three times longer than traditional searches, a figure from a US report dated May 2026, and that click-through rates are already similar between sponsored and organic product listings inside AI Mode, citing internal US data from August 20 to September 3. It has said AI Mode queries were more than three times longer since its first usage disclosure in May.
The expansion landed the same day as Alphabet's third-quarter results, in which Google Search and other revenue rose 12% to $63.4 billion and chief executive Sundar Pichai said AI investments were driving search query growth to its fastest rate in five years. Google did not link the ad expansion to the results.
OpenAI is moving the same way inside ChatGPT, where it said this month it would test ads during image generation.
Limits#
- The click-through comparison and query-length figure are Google's internal data; no independent measurement of ad performance in AI Mode is public.
- Google did not give revenue figures for AI Mode ads or say how multiturn ads are chosen.
- Exact launch dates for the fourth-quarter countries were not given.