On September 4, 2026, Google Ads Liaison Ginny Marvin confirmed that ordinary Search campaigns using exact or phrase match keywords are now eligible to serve text ads inside AI Mode, closing what had been one of the more consequential targeting gaps in Google’s advertising stack. The confirmation, delivered in a LinkedIn comment and to Search Engine Roundtable, was framed as a “small experiment.” The scale of what it opens isn’t small at all.
AI Mode passed 1 billion monthly users by Google I/O 2026, with queries more than doubling each quarter since launch, according to Google. Similarweb data from August 2026 shows nearly 30 percent of ad-eligible AI Mode queries already carrying ads. Until this week, the only supported routes into that inventory were AI Max for Search and Performance Max, both of which trade keyword control for Google’s automation and Smart Bidding. Advertisers who had deliberately built lean, keyword-tight campaigns were, in effect, priced out of the fastest-growing consumer discovery surface Google operates.
The behavior was spotted first by ADSQUIRE founder Anthony Higman, who posted on LinkedIn that Google was “serving regular pure search campaigns with restrictive match types in AI mode,” documented “through multiple campaigns and tests on our side.” Marvin’s on-record framing set the ceiling: “Exact and phrase match keywords are eligible to serve text ads in AI Mode. Note however that this is limited to cases where there is explicit and direct user intent. AI Max and PMax for Search are designed to capture complex conversational intent and access our latest ad formats (like Highlighted Answers).”
That last clause is the tell. Text ads get in. The premium conversational surface, Highlighted Answers, stays walled off behind the automation products. In an X exchange with Barry Schwartz of Search Engine Roundtable, Higman argued Marvin’s word choice suggested more than a pilot. Google’s on-record position is only that the experiment has begun.
The measurement problem is the catch. Google Ads currently offers no way to separate AI Mode delivery from ordinary Search delivery in reporting, per PPC Land. Google hasn’t published a definition of “explicit and direct user intent,” named a country, disclosed an end date, or released performance data. Relevant Audience recommends the disciplined response: segment search terms, log unexplained impression or CPC movement against dates, and change nothing structural on the strength of an experiment Google itself called small.
The pattern is familiar from every prior Google ads-surface expansion. Eligibility arrives quietly, reporting arrives later, and by the time the dashboards catch up the defaults have already shifted. The same week brought AI search reporting expanded to every website, part of a wider repricing of visibility as conversational AI reshapes small-business discovery. Keyword control, briefly, is back on the table for the surface that matters most.
Sources
- https://searchengineland.com/google-tests-traditional-search-campaigns-in-ai-mode-487199
- https://www.seroundtable.com/google-ads-serving-restrictive-match-types-ai-mode-42024.html
- https://www.marketingprofs.com/opinions/2026/55845/ai-update-september-11-2026-ai-news-and-views-from-the-past-week
- https://ppc.land/exact-and-phrase-match-keywords-gain-ai-mode-ads-in-google-test/
- https://www.relevantaudience.com/google-ads-en/google-ads-exact-phrase-match-ai-mode-experiment/