How to track Google AI Mode for your brand.

AI Mode is Google’s chat-style search. Instead of ten blue links, a buyer gets a full-page answer that names a few brands, links a few pages and invites a follow-up question. Tracking AI Mode means knowing, question by question, whether your brand is one of the names it gives, and which pages it trusts to back that up.

What AI Mode is

AI Mode is a separate tab in Google Search, added in 2025. People open it on purpose, usually for longer questions they would once have split into several searches: comparisons, plans, “which one should I buy” questions.

Google says AI Mode breaks a question into smaller ones and searches for each of them at the same time (it calls this query fan-out), then writes one answer from what it finds. Links sit beside and inside the answer, and the conversation carries on: each follow-up builds on the last.

How it differs from AI Overviews

AI Overviews and AI Mode both come from Google, but they behave differently enough to track separately.

	AI Overviews	AI Mode
Where it appears	Above the ordinary results	Its own tab, a full page
When it appears	Only on some searches, chosen by Google	Whenever someone opens it
What people type	Short searches	Longer, conversational questions
Follow-ups	None	Each one builds on the conversation

The same question can get a different answer in each. A brand that appears in the AI Overview for “best running shoes for wide feet” can be missing from AI Mode’s answer to “I have wide feet and run most days, what should I buy?”, and the other way round. If AI Overviews matter more to your traffic, bestaioverviewtracking.com ranks the tools that track those.

Check AI Mode by hand

You can open any question straight into AI Mode with a link in this form:

https://www.google.com/search?udm=50&q=your+question+here

Use a private window so your search history colours the answer as little as possible. For each question, note three things: whether your brand is named, where it comes in the list, and whether any of your own pages are linked. Our free check writes eight buyer questions for you and opens each one in AI Mode.

Ask each question fresh. Continuing an old conversation changes the answer, because AI Mode remembers what came before.

What Search Console shows

Google says AI Mode clicks and impressions are included in Search Console’s web search report, but at the time of writing they are not separated from ordinary search. You can see that traffic moved, but not whether AI Mode caused it, which questions it answered or whether your brand was named.

Use Search Console for clicks and a tracker, or your own notes, for what the answers say.

Pick the questions to track

Start with 20 to 50 questions a real buyer would ask, written the way people talk, not as keywords. Your sales calls, support inbox and site search are the best sources. Mix three kinds:

• Category questions, such as “What are the best running shoes for wide feet, and why?”
• Problem questions, such as “My knees hurt after long runs. What shoes help?”
• Brand questions, such as “Is Lope any good?” and “What are the best alternatives to Lope?”

Category and problem questions show whether AI Mode recommends you to people who have never heard of you. Brand questions show what it tells people who have.

When a tool is worth it

Checking by hand works for a dozen questions once a month. It stops working when you need:

• History, to see whether a change you made moved anything.
• Many questions, across products, markets or clients.
• Competitor share, so you know who takes the space you lose.
• The same answers from fixed locations, so this week’s result compares with last week’s.

Fewer tools track AI Mode than track AI Overviews or ChatGPT, and few check it daily on their cheapest plan. Our ranking lists every tool that includes AI Mode on its entry plan, and the cost guide shows what each one buys.

What to do with the results

When AI Mode leaves you out, read the pages it links. They show what Google is drawing on for that question: often reviews, forums, comparison pages and the brands’ own product pages.

The fixes that tend to help are the plain ones. Answer the question clearly near the top of your page. Keep prices, sizes and specs current. Publish comparisons that are honest about where you fit. Get mentioned on the third-party sites AI Mode already links. Then change one thing at a time and give it a few weeks before you judge it.