NZ Google AI Overviews Study 2026
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Original research by AI Search Marketing Agency, Auckland, New Zealand
https://aisearchmarketing.agency/research/nz-google-ai-overviews-study-2026

WHAT THIS IS
A 1,000-query Google New Zealand desktop study measuring how often, and how
prominently, Google AI Overviews appear across 20 industries and five search
intents. Captured 8 September 2026 via DataForSEO. Every search was written and
locked in before collection and nothing was added, removed or edited after results
were seen.

HEADLINE RESULTS
- 73.9% of the 1,000 balanced commercial searches showed an AI Overview
  (739 of 1,000; margin of error under three percentage points).
- Intent was the dividing line: 96.5% of advice searches and 96.0% of cost
  searches, against 16.5% of local-provider searches.
- When present, the AI Overview was the first element on the page 88.4% of the
  time. 66.0% of all searches had an AI Overview above the first organic result.
- Industry rates ranged from 62% to 88%, a much smaller effect than intent.
- Weighting the 275 searches with positive Google Ads volume by that volume
  gives 27.0%. Disclosed as a sensitivity check, not a population estimate.
- A re-run of 100 searches shortly afterwards agreed on presence 93% of the time.

FILES IN THIS PACKAGE
Data (CSV, UTF-8, comma separated; every row carries source and licence columns)
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-1000-serps.csv                  Row-level results for all 1,000 searches, with search-volume enrichment (1,000 rows)
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-frozen-keywords.csv             The full 1,000-search list, as locked before collection (1,000 rows)
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-analysis-by-intent.csv          Prevalence and prominence by search intent, with margin-of-error ranges (5 rows)
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-analysis-by-industry.csv        Prevalence and prominence by industry, with margin-of-error ranges (20 rows)
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-analysis-by-industry-intent.csv The 100 industry x intent cells (100 rows)
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-qa-recaptures.csv               The 100 searches run a second time, with both results (100 rows)
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-cost-ledger.csv                 Complete DataForSEO API cost ledger (7 rows)
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-most-cited-domains.csv          Top 50 domains cited by the 739 AI Overviews (descriptive analysis) (50 rows)

Workbook and report
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-workbook.xlsx                   All tables above plus summary, prominence and native charts
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-report.pdf                      The full results page as a print-ready PDF
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-media-release.txt               Publication-ready media release

Charts (PNG, 2800px wide, branded; -web versions are 1400px)
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-equal-vs-volume-weighted.png
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-industry-intent-heatmap.png
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-most-cited-domains.png
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-prevalence-by-industry.png
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-prevalence-by-intent.png
  nz-ai-overviews-study-2026-prominence.png

Read the methodology before comparing these numbers with other studies:
https://aisearchmarketing.agency/research/nz-google-ai-overviews-study-2026-methodology

HOW TO CITE
AI Search Marketing Agency (2026). New Zealand Google AI Overviews Study 2026: a 1,000-query balanced desktop snapshot. Auckland, New Zealand. https://aisearchmarketing.agency/research/nz-google-ai-overviews-study-2026

In running text: "According to AI Search Marketing Agency's 2026 study of 1,000
New Zealand Google searches, AI Overviews appeared on 74% of commercial queries
and on 96% of advice and pricing queries."

LICENCE
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0).
You may copy, share, adapt and republish the data and charts, including for
commercial use, provided you credit "AI Search Marketing Agency" and link to
https://aisearchmarketing.agency/research/nz-google-ai-overviews-study-2026
Embedding a chart? Please keep the source line on the image and link the image
to the study page.

WHAT THE STUDY DOES NOT MEASURE
Clicks, traffic, revenue, citation accuracy or user behaviour. It is a
time-specific desktop snapshot of a purposive, balanced sample, not a
probability sample of all New Zealand searches.

WANT TO KNOW YOUR OWN EXPOSURE?
We run a free AI Visibility Audit: we test the buying questions your customers
ask across Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini, and show you
where you are cited and where competitors are cited instead.
https://aisearchmarketing.agency/contact

Marcos Azaro
AI Search & SEO Consultant, AI Search Marketing Agency
marcos@aisearchmarketing.agency
https://aisearchmarketing.agency/