Here's why I turned off AI Overviews and why you should consider it too

As a major AI advocate and enthusiast, I was among the first to sign up for Google’s Search Generative Experience—also known as Google AI Overviews. When I initially tried the feature, it was only available through Search Labs and entirely optional. Out of curiosity — especially as someone who writes for a living and closely follows AI developments — I decided to explore it and see how it might continue to disrupt my industry.

For the first few weeks, I found myself frequently reviewing the AI-generated results, though I always took an extra step to dive deeper into the actual sources or traditional search listings further down the page. That’s when I realized that, like most things related to AI, the results varied wildly in terms of accuracy. For basic questions like “When did World War II start?” it worked fairly well. But when I looked into more specific topics (like individual battles or exact dates) the cracks started to show.

As time went on, I found myself instinctively scrolling past the AI responses for about 90% of my searches. Part of this was due to a lack of trust in the information. But the bigger reason? This wasn’t how I wanted to use AI in the first place.

When I have a question that’s philosophical, theoretical, open-ended, whimsical, or just an idea I want to work through, I’m far more likely to turn to ChatGPT or Gemini. But if it’s a critically important or broader topic — one that benefits from trustworthy sources and a human perspective—I turn to Google Search.

For example, I wouldn’t trust Gemini’s AI to help me find the best phones under $500. The AI results for buying advice often mix outdated and current models, misquote specs, or contain other inaccuracies. But I would trust it to answer something simple, like clarifying a Monopoly rule—where the stakes are much lower if the answer is off.

I generally use AI for lower-stakes questions—ones where a wrong answer won’t lead to injury or serious mistakes. That’s why I ultimately disabled the feature in Search Labs. Admittedly, it took me a while to do it—I only turned it off a few months ago because it became easy to ignore. But now it’s back, and this time, there’s no way to opt out.

I had hoped the experience would have improved by the time of its broader rollout, but unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be the case. Some of the advice being generated is downright dangerous—from a suggestion that someone drink urine to stay hydrated to bizarre tips about fixing blinkers that included checking for “blinker fluid.”

That prompted me to look up ways to turn off AI Overviews entirely. I was surprised to learn there’s no real way to do that—at least not officially. But there are a few workarounds that achieve the same effect. If you haven’t yet disabled Google AI Overviews on your desktop, I strongly recommend doing so.

Maybe someday Google Overviews will be worth revisiting; that’s a discussion for another time. But for now, do yourself a favor and stick to more trustworthy sources for your search results.

How to turn off Google AI overviews on desktop

While there are other methods like special plug-ins, these are all vulnerable to Google changes and could easily be broken. Probably the simplest and best solution is to change your browser settings. For those with Chrome, you simply need to follow the following instructions:

1. Open Chrome and put chrome://settings/searchEngines in the search box.
2. A new tab will open, go to Search Engine > Manage Search Engines and Site Search.
3. Click on the Add button by the Site Search update. A new box will open.
4. Fill in the form with the following:
   1. Name: AI Free Web
   2. Shortcut: @web
   3. {google:baseURL}search?q=%s&udm=14
5. You’ll now see AI Free Web in the list.
6. Click on the three stacked dots on the right side of this new option. Select Make Default.

Going forward, if you use the search box to trigger Google, you won’t get any of the Google AI overview results. Technically, these just bypass the main search results and filter out everything as opposed to truly disabling Google AI overviews. The result is about the same, however.

How to block Google AI overviews on mobile

Unfortunately, blocking Google AI overviews on mobile is a much more difficult prospect than on desktop. There’s no support for plugins, and while you can technically select a custom search engine, you can’t add the necessary filter string yourself. The good news is that there’s a workaround site called tenbluelinks.org, which aims to make it easier to rid the web of unwelcome AI overlays on mobile.

To quickly change Chrome (or any mobile browser that supports custom search engines) on Android, you just need to visit the aforementioned site from your mobile device. From there:

1. Open a new tab and search for anything in Google. This step can’t be skipped.
2. Next, tap on the three dots menu in the bottom right corner.
3. Choose Settings > Search Engine. “Google Web” will show up in the Recently Visited section.
4. Once you select Google Web you’ll no longer see the AI overviews in search results through the main search bar.

Firefox can hide Google AI overviews for you on mobile

While you can use the above method in Firefox, it’s also possible to change it manually in Firefox:

1. Open Firefox and go to the three stacked dots in the upper-right corner. Select Settings.
2. Select Search. In the new window, you’ll want tap on Default Search Engine.
3. In the new screen, you’ll be presented with your existing options.
4. Tap Add Search Engine.
5. Fill in the name with AI-free Web and search string with google.com/search?udm=14&q=%s
6. Tap Save, and you’re done!