There is no single setting that turns off Google AI for good. Google treats AI Overviews as a core part of Search, not an optional feature, so the company has not built a global toggle. What you do have are several workarounds that reliably hide the AI summary and bring back plain search results on desktop, Android, and iPhone.
Is There an Official Off Switch
Google considers AI Overviews a standard search feature—like knowledge panels or featured snippets—that users cannot turn off. Search Labs, the experimental features hub at labs.google.com, once had a toggle for AI Overviews. For most accounts, that toggle is gone now, because the feature has moved out of the experimental stage and into the main product.
So when people ask if you can turn off Google AI, the honest answer is no, not through an account setting. What works instead are search tricks, URL parameters, and browser changes that filter the AI box out of view. All tested methods worked on a live Google account, though a few required an extra step missed by older guides.
It also helps to know why Google resists a real toggle in the first place. AI Overviews boost ad revenue and keep users on Google, so allowing them to be turned off hurts their business model. That business incentive is part of why the workarounds below exist as workarounds and not as a supported feature.
Quick Fixes for One-Time Searches
1. Click the Web Filter
After you run a search, look at the row of filter tabs below the search bar (Images, News, Shopping, and so on). On many searches, you will see a “Web” tab. Tap it, and Google switches to a classic, link-only results page with no AI summary at the top.
This filter does not stick between searches. You have to click it again each time, but it is the fastest way to see a clean page when you just need one quick answer.
2. Add -AI to Your Search Query
Typing a minus sign followed by AI at the end of your query, for example, “best laptop for college -AI”, tells Google to exclude that term from the results and often suppresses the AI Overview along with it. It is not perfect, and Google can change how this behaves at any time, but it takes two extra keystrokes and works on both desktop and mobile browsers.
In my own testing, the -AI trick worked on most searches but occasionally let a smaller AI summary box slip through on shopping-related queries. If that happens, pairing it with the Web filter from the previous tip usually clears the page completely.
Permanent Fixes for Desktop
1. Use the udm=14 URL Parameter
Google Search actually runs on a set of internal modes, and each one has a short code called udm. Adding &udm=14 to the end of any Google search URL forces the classic web results mode, the same one the old “Web” filter used to load by default before AI Overviews existed. A search for coffee makers would look like this: google.com/search?q=coffee+makers&udm=14.
You can bookmark that pattern, or type it directly into the address bar each time, and it will consistently skip the AI summary.
2. Set udm=14 as Your Default Search Engine in Chrome
You can make the fix permanent so you never have to add the parameter by hand. In Chrome, open Settings, then Search engine, then Manage search engines and site search. Add a new search engine with the URL google.com/search?q=%s&udm=14, then set it as your default. From that point on, typing a query straight into the address bar loads the AI-free version automatically. Firefox and Edge support the same custom search engine setup in their own settings menus.
3. Try a Browser Extension
Several free extensions, built specifically to hide the AI Overview box, are available for Chrome and Firefox. They work by detecting and removing the AI summary element from the page after it loads, so search stays fast, and the rest of the page looks normal. Extensions are convenient, but they depend on Google’s page structure staying the same, so they occasionally need an update after Google changes its layout.
How to Turn Off AI Overviews on Android and iPhone
1. Check Search Labs on Mobile
Open the Google app, tap your profile picture in the top right corner, then tap Search Labs. If AI Overviews still appears as a listed experiment on your account, you can toggle it off there. Many accounts no longer see this option because the feature graduated out of Labs, but it is worth checking since Google rolls changes out in stages.
2. Use the Web Filter or udm=14 on Mobile
The same Web tab and udm=14 trick from desktop work in the Google app and in mobile Safari or Chrome. On iPhone and Android, you can also set up a custom search engine inside Safari or Chrome’s mobile settings using the same google.com/search?q=%s&udm=14 pattern described above, though the menu path is a few taps deeper than on desktop.
If a Method Suddenly Stops Working
Google adjusts Search constantly, sometimes several times a month, so a workaround that worked last week can behave differently today. If the Web tab disappears from your filter row, or the udm=14 parameter stops filtering out the AI box, try these in order.
First, clear your browser cache and reload the search page, since a cached version of Google’s layout can hold onto an outdated interface. Second, check whether you are still signed into the Google account where you made the change, because udm=14 as a default search engine is stored per browser profile, not per Google account, and a fresh browser profile will not carry it over. Third, confirm the extension you are using, if any, has an update available, since extension developers usually patch within a few days of a layout change on Google’s end.
What About Google AI Mode
AI Mode is a separate tab next to your search results that turns Google into a full conversational assistant, remembering earlier questions in the same session. It is not the same product as AI Overviews, and none of the tricks above remove the AI Mode tab itself. If you want to avoid it, the simplest approach is to just not tap that tab. It does not activate unless you open it directly.
Why So Many Want AI Overviews Gone
Part of the frustration is trust. AI Overviews summarize content pulled from multiple sites, and the summary can misstate what the source actually said, which is harder to catch than a bad link in a normal results list. Part of it is habit. Long-time users are used to scanning a list of blue links and picking the source themselves, not reading a pre-written paragraph before they even see those links.
There is also a traffic effect that matters beyond personal preference. Pew Research Center found that people are less likely to click through to a website when an AI summary answers their question right on the results page, which means fewer visits reach the original publishers whose reporting or research the summary is built from. For anyone who values reading the primary source directly, rather than a machine’s condensed version of it, that is reason enough to keep one of the workarounds above close at hand.
Accuracy complaints are not new either. Shortly after AI Overviews first rolled out, screenshots circulated showing the feature confidently stating advice that was wrong on its face, drawn from a single joke post or forum comment treated as a factual source. Google has since narrowed the sources AI Overviews pull from and added more guardrails, but the underlying risk has not disappeared. An AI summary can still flatten a nuanced or disputed topic into one confident-sounding paragraph, with no easy way for a reader to see which source it leaned on most.
For searches that carry real consequences- medical symptoms, tax questions, legal deadlines- that flattening effect is exactly why many people prefer to click through to a named source and read the full context themselves rather than take a generated summary at face value.
