How to get rid of AI Overview on Google

Can you turn off AI Overview on Google?

Not with a switch. Google’s own help page calls AI Overviews “a core Google Search feature” and says features like it “cannot be turned off.” What Google does offer is the Web filter: a results view with only text links, without AI Overviews. Everything below builds on that, plus one extension for people who want the rest of Google’s page to stay the same.

Every device at a glance

Find where you search, then pick how far you want to go. The last column links the full guide for that device.

Option 1: Use the Web filter (any device)

This works in every browser and needs nothing installed.

1. Search Google as usual.
2. In the row of filters under the search box (All, Images, Videos and so on), choose Web. If you don’t see it, look under More.
3. The page reloads with plain links: no AI Overview, and none of the other boxes either.

The catch: it lasts for that search only. Your next search opens the normal page again, AI Overview included. To make it permanent on a computer, use option 2.

Option 2: Make Google open the Web filter every time (computer)

The Web filter has its own web address. Add &udm=14 to a Google search link and the results open in the Web view. Set that link up as your default search engine, and every search from the address bar skips AI Overviews. The address to use:

https://www.google.com/search?q=%s&udm=14

The %s is where your browser puts what you typed.

Chrome

1. Click the three-dot menu at the top right, then Settings.
2. On the left, choose Search engine, then Manage search engines and site search.
3. Next to Site search, click Add.
4. Give it a name (for example “Google Web”), a shortcut (for example “gw”), and paste the address above into URL with %s in place of query. Click Add.
5. Find it in the list, click its three-dot menu and choose Make default.

Edge and Brave

Both are built on the same engine as Chrome and have the same kind of setting. Open Settings, type “search engines” into the settings search box, add a search engine with the address above, then make it the default.

Firefox

1. Open the menu and choose Settings, then Search on the left.
2. In Additional search engines, click Add search engine.
3. Name it, paste the address above into the URL box, and click Add Engine.
4. Pick it as your default search engine at the top of the same page.

Firefox added this in version 140; on older versions you need an add-on. More Firefox options are in the Firefox guide.

What you give up: the Web view drops every extra box, not just the AI one. No image strip, no map, no “People also ask”. If you want those back, option 3 is the better fit.

Option 3: Hide only the AI box with an extension (Chrome, Edge, Brave)

An extension can remove the AI Overview and leave the rest of Google’s page alone. I built Search Cleaner for this. It hides AI Overviews from the moment you install it, and its menu has 25 switches for the other boxes Google adds: the AI Mode tab, sponsored results, shopping carousels, “People also ask”, the knowledge panel on the right, and more. Turn on only what you want gone.

It’s a free Chrome extension, so it works in Chrome on a computer and in browsers that install from the Chrome Web Store, like Edge and Brave. It runs on google.com searches, not country versions such as google.co.uk, and it can’t run in phone browsers. For a side-by-side with the Firefox add-on many people try first, see Bye Bye Google AI vs Search Cleaner.

On iPhone, iPad and Android

Phone browsers don’t run Chrome extensions, and the Google app has no setting for AI Overviews. Your options:

• The Web filter. It’s in the row of filters under the search box, sometimes under More. It works for one search at a time.
• On iPhone and iPad: a Safari content blocker that lets you add your own rules can hide the AI box. The iPhone guide and the Safari guide walk through it.
• On Android: see the Android guide for Chrome, the Google app and Gmail.
• Another search engine. AI Overviews are a Google feature, so they don’t show on other search engines. Some of those have AI answers of their own, so check their settings.

AI Mode and Gmail are different switches

Three Google AI features get mixed up:

• AI Overview is the summary box at the top of normal results. That’s this guide.
• AI Mode is a separate tab and chat-style search. See how to turn off AI Mode in Google Search and how to disable AI Mode in Chrome.
• Gemini in Gmail writes summaries and drafts in your inbox. See how to turn off AI in Gmail.

What doesn’t turn it off

• Google Labs. Turning off “AI in Search” in Labs only stops the experiments you signed up to try. It doesn’t remove AI Overviews, which aren’t an experiment.
• Your Google account settings. Google says the feature can’t be turned off, so there’s no account switch for it.
• Searching once with the Web filter. The next search brings AI Overview back. Set it as your default search engine (option 2) to keep it gone.