Ahrefs: AI Overviews cut CTR 23% in France

Ahrefs tracked 963 high-traffic French domains through Google Search Console for 28 days before and 9 days after AI Overviews launched in France on July 22, 2026. Sites most exposed to AI Overviews — more than 20% of their queries triggering one — lost 23.1% of their click-through rate; the overall median site lost 5.7% of CTR and 8.8% of clicks, and nearly 48% of sites lost more than 10% of daily clicks within nine days. Health queries were hit hardest, with a 22.2% AI Overview rate and a 20.4% CTR decline. The analysis, by Ahrefs’ Juliette Begue, found roughly “one point of CTR lost per point of exposure.”