Rand Fishkin has come out with his 2024 edition of the Google zero click study and it shows that in the US, zero clicks are now at 58.5%, which is down from 65% in 2021. The study says that about 37% of Google searches lead to no action, 21.4% lead to another Google search, and 41.5% lead to a click.
Here is a chart that they created based on this data:
Rand wrote, "Most interesting to web publishers, entrepreneurs, creators, and (hopefully) regulators is the final number: for every 1,000 searches on Google in the United States, 360 clicks make it to a non-Google-owned, non-Google-ad-paying property. Nearly 2/3rds of all searches stay inside the Google ecosystem after making a query."
Let's not forget that Google disputed the last zero click study - for what that is worth.
Here is a chart over time, showing the decline in clicks:
Here is another chart showing more clicks from Google Search to Google properties or Google Search:
Then by device:
They also looked at AI Overviews and Rand summed it up:
- Desktop searches rose a little
- Mobile searches fell a considerable amount (if anything spooked Google into rolling back this feature, I’d put my money on this being it)
- Clicks per search on mobile rose
- Clicks per search of desktop were flat
The issue with Rand's AI Overviews part is that it only officially rolled out publicly to US users - it is still labs opt in for the EU, I believe.
I can confirm you that no AIO is present in Europe. I sincerely don’t know if with Labs activated is visible, but surely not for the general public.
— Gianluca Fiorelli (@gfiorelli1) July 3, 2024
Rand also spent some time explaining some answers on the questions he received on the data in the study, including the 1% of clicks going to ads:
This is worth a read, check it out over here.
Forum discussion at X.
Image concept credit to Greg Sterling
