Bye Bye Google AI vs Search Cleaner: A Better Way to Hide AI Overviews (2026)
April 24, 2026 · 7 min read
If you searched for Bye Bye Google AI, you already know what you want: Google search results without the AI Overview block at the top. The good news is there are several tools that do this. The less obvious news is they remove very different amounts of stuff, support different browsers, and treat your data differently.
This post is a clean comparison between Bye Bye Google AI and Search Cleaner, written for people who want to make an informed choice rather than install the first thing they see.
The Short Version
Bye Bye Google AI is a focused, single-purpose extension. It hides the AI Overview block on Google search results. That is what it does. It does that one thing well.
Search Cleaner is a broader tool. It hides AI Overviews and 24 other Google search elements: sponsored ads, shopping carousels, People Also Ask boxes, knowledge panels, related searches, video carousels, image packs, and more. Each element has its own toggle switch, so you decide what stays and what goes.
If the only thing bothering you is the AI Overview, either tool will work. If the AI Overview is the loudest annoyance but not the only one, Search Cleaner saves you from installing five extensions.
What Bye Bye Google AI Does Well
Bye Bye Google AI is a single-purpose Firefox extension that removes Google AI Overviews from search results. It is small, fast, and does not try to do anything else. For users who only want one thing removed and prefer minimal extensions, it is a reasonable choice.
It is also free and open about what it does. The scope is the scope. There is no upsell or feature creep.
Where it falls short for many users is browser support and scope. It is built for Firefox first. If you use Chrome, Edge, Brave, Safari, or Arc as your daily browser, you need a different tool. And if your real complaint is that modern Google search has gotten cluttered in general, blocking just the AI Overview leaves a lot of noise on the page.
What Search Cleaner Does Differently
Search Cleaner takes the same idea and makes it granular. Instead of one toggle for AI Overviews, you get 25 individual toggles for the components that make up a modern Google search page.
The core ones people enable on day one: hide AI Overviews, hide sponsored ads, hide shopping carousels, hide People Also Ask. After that, users typically experiment with hiding video carousels, image packs, knowledge panels, related searches at the bottom of the page, and the discussions and forums section.
Everything is local. The extension uses CSS injection and a MutationObserver to hide elements as Google loads them, so the page does not flash content before hiding it. There is no server, no account, and no data collection.
It runs on Chromium-based browsers, which means Chrome, Edge, Brave, Arc, Opera, and Vivaldi all work.
Feature-by-Feature Comparison
AI Overview removal: both tools handle this well.
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Search Cleaner
Search Cleaner is a free Chrome extension that removes ads, AI overviews, shopping carousels, and clutter from Google Search results. 25 ind...
Open in Chrome Web StoreOther Google clutter: only Search Cleaner. Bye Bye Google AI is scoped to AI Overviews only.
Granular control: only Search Cleaner. Each of the 25 elements has its own switch, so power users can tune the page to look the way they want.
Firefox support: Bye Bye Google AI is Firefox-native. Search Cleaner is Chromium-focused at the time of writing.
Chrome / Edge / Brave / Arc support: Search Cleaner is the better fit.
Privacy: both extensions process locally. Neither sends your search data anywhere.
Update cadence: Google ships layout changes constantly. Single-purpose extensions can lag when Google renames a CSS class. A multi-element extension has more surface area but also tends to ship updates faster because more users notice and report breakage.
Which Should You Pick
Pick Bye Bye Google AI if you use Firefox as your main browser, you only want the AI Overview removed, and you prefer the smallest possible extension footprint.
Pick Search Cleaner if you use a Chromium-based browser, you want the AI Overview gone plus other clutter cleaned up, and you like granular control with the option to dial elements back as you go.
If you have already installed Bye Bye Google AI on Firefox and it works for you, there is no reason to switch. The point of this comparison is to give Chrome, Edge, Brave, and Arc users a path that does not require waiting for a Firefox extension to be ported.
What About Mobile
Neither extension solves mobile in a meaningful way today, because Chrome and Safari on iOS and Android limit what extensions can do compared to the desktop versions.
If mobile AI Overviews are your bigger problem, the path is different: you turn off AI Overviews at the Google account level, switch your default search to a non-Google engine for sensitive queries, or use a content blocker that supports custom rules. We have separate guides for the mobile path; this post is focused on the desktop comparison.
Is Bye Bye Google AI Safe
Yes. It is a small open-source extension with a clear scope. The same applies to Search Cleaner. Both are honest about what they do, both run locally, and neither asks for unnecessary permissions. As always with browser extensions, install only from the official store listing for your browser.
Final Take
Both tools solve a real problem: Google search has gotten loud, and AI Overviews are the loudest part. Bye Bye Google AI is the right pick for Firefox users who want a minimal, single-purpose extension. Search Cleaner is the right pick for Chromium-browser users who want the AI Overview gone plus the option to clean up everything else on the page.
Whichever you choose, the goal is the same: a search results page that gets you to a real link in fewer scrolls, with less noise, and without an AI summary you did not ask for.
