Google has added AI to web search: here is how to disable it

Google Overview has arrived in France, disrupting web search as we know it. Artificial intelligence now takes centre stage: when someone submits a query, links to websites are no longer shown first. Instead, Gemini produces an AI summary that brings together information gathered from across the internet.

How Google Overview is changing web search

For instance, if you Google “lemon tart recipe”, the top result is no longer a link to a well-known cookery website, but the recipe itself, generated by AI. This pushes specialist sites - the original sources of that information, it is worth remembering - into the background. More broadly, it fundamentally changes how a search engine operates. Rather than an online directory, it becomes an AI tool that appropriates other people’s content. It is also a tool that makes repeated mistakes.

With Overview, an entire economic model is being weakened. Although this raises a question of adaptability - including for us, as we will need to change the way we create content - it also presents an almost ideological issue: will users accept results generated by AI?

How to remove Google Overview from Chrome

Google does not offer a choice: it is Overview or nothing. There is no tick box available to switch the feature off. Fortunately, there is a workaround that lets you restore the web search experience you are used to. It takes less than a minute to set up on the desktop version of Chrome:

• Open Settings by clicking the three dots in the top-right corner of your browser, then using the submenu.
• Select the Search engine tab.
• Click Manage search engines and site search.
• Scroll down to the Site search section and click Add.
• In the window that opens, enter Google in the Name field, http://google.com in the Shortcut field, and https://www.google.com/search?udm=14&q=%25s in the URL field.
• Click the three dots next to the search engine you have created, then select Make default.

Using Google Overview alternatives in other browsers

Once this is done, Google Overview will no longer appear when you search with Google. Chrome will force standard results to be displayed instead of Gemini. The process is similar in other browsers. If you would rather not make this change, you can turn to extensions for Chrome or Firefox, which must be downloaded.

This is only a temporary fix, however, as Google will continue expanding its AI search in future. Anyone opposed to AI will therefore need to find workarounds to recover the good old web directory - the very purpose for which Google was originally developed.