Is Google Search Getting Worse: Data and Analysis for 2026

A lot of people feel Google search has gotten worse: more ads, more listicles, more AI answers, fewer useful links. The feeling isn't just nostalgia. There's some evidence behind it, and some changes Google has made in response.

What research found

A 2024 study from researchers at Leipzig University and partners, "Is Google Getting Worse?", tracked product review searches on Google, Bing, and DuckDuckGo for a year. They found that top results were heavily dominated by pages built for affiliate income and search optimization, often with thinner content, and that all three search engines struggled with it. Updates helped temporarily before spam adapted.

What Google has changed

• Spam and quality updates: Google said its March 2024 core update cut low-quality, unoriginal content in results by 45 percent.
• More forum content: Reddit and other forums now appear far more often, because people were adding "reddit" to searches to find real experiences.
• AI Overviews and AI Mode: AI-written summaries now sit above many results, which answers some questions faster and pushes links further down.
• More ads and shopping units on commercial searches.

So is it worse?

It depends on what you search. Quick facts are often faster than ever. Product research, recipes, and "best X" searches are where results feel most cluttered. And because more space goes to AI summaries, ads, and widgets, you scroll further to reach independent sites.

How to get better results

1. Use search operators: quotes for exact phrases, a minus sign to exclude words, and site: to search one site. Here's a guide to operators.
2. Clean up the page. Search Cleaner removes AI Overviews, AI Mode prompts, and sponsored results so you see plain links.
3. Try another engine for some searches; DuckDuckGo, Kagi, and Brave compared.
4. Go to the source for reviews and specs: manufacturer pages, specialist forums, and trusted reviewers.