Is Reddit's CEO right that Google's AI Mode doesn't drive traffic?

Partly right, but not the full picture. Reddit's own data shows a sharp drop in search referrals that coincided with Google's AI Mode expansion, and independent research backs up the direction of travel. But Google's aggregate click numbers, and Reddit's own admission that it hasn't isolated the cause, mean "does not drive traffic... to anybody" overstates what the evidence actually proves.

What Reddit's CEO actually said about Google AI Mode

Speaking to investors on 29 October 2026, Reddit CEO Steve Huffman put it bluntly: "The reality is, AI Mode does not drive traffic. Not for us, and not to anybody, as far as I know." He pointed to Google's AI Overviews and AI Mode expanding across the US and other markets, pushing traditional results further down the page, and flagged that Reddit's machine-translated content is ranking lower, which would mainly hit traffic outside the US (Dealroom).

This wasn't a new theme for Huffman. On the Q3 2025 earnings call he'd already said chatbots were "not a traffic driver today... not a major traffic driver today," noting Google search and direct access remained Reddit's top sources. An analyst cited roughly 50% of Reddit's traffic from Google and 50% direct, which Huffman called "approximate, but pretty close" (TechCrunch). The October 2026 comments extended that argument from chatbots to Google's own AI Mode.

The numbers behind Reddit's traffic drop

Reddit told investors that search referrals fell by more than 1,000,000 per week on average in October 2026 (Dealroom). The market reaction was immediate: Reuters reported Reddit shares fell 18% in extended trading after the warning (Dealroom).

Reddit itself has not isolated Google AI as the definitive cause. It's calling that the leading part of its hypothesis rather than a confirmed explanation (Dealroom), a caveat that got lost in most of the coverage of Huffman's quote.

What Google says in response

Google has pushed back with aggregate numbers. Nick Fox, Google's Senior Vice President of Knowledge & Information, said its AI Search features, including AI Overviews and AI Mode, are now sending "billions of clicks to websites every week" (Crawlvision). Search chief Liz Reid made a similar case in an August 2025 blog post, writing that total organic clicks from Google to websites had been relatively stable year on year, and that the clicks that remain are of higher quality because users are less likely to bounce straight back (Technology.org). Reid has also argued that AI Overviews prompt people to ask longer, more complex questions, which is why click quality is rising even as raw volume shifts (Press Gazette).

The trouble with Google's defence is that it comes without detailed metrics on how many clicks come from AI Overviews versus AI Mode specifically, or how today's numbers compare with pre-AI-Search traffic (Crawlvision). When Google's October 2026 earnings call came around, it didn't provide a new traffic figure for AI Mode at all, a contrast with the billions-of-clicks claim made back in July (Cornford and Cross).

Independent data on AI Mode, AI Overviews and clicks

Several independent sources point the same direction as Huffman, even if none confirm his absolute claim. Pew Research Centre tracked browsing behaviour from 900 US adults across 68,879 Google searches in March 2025 and found users clicked a traditional result in 15% of visits without an AI summary, versus 8% with one, a 47% lower click rate. Links embedded directly in AI summaries were clicked in only 1% of visits (Forbes Advisor). Pew also recorded a higher rate of sessions ending entirely when an Overview appeared: 26%, compared with 16% on pages with only traditional results (MyOho Marketing). Google has disputed Pew's methodology, claiming the study period overlapped with unrelated algorithm testing (Search Engine Journal).

A separate experimental study, with subjects randomly assigned to use AI Mode, found they were substantially less likely to click through to external websites, and that removing AI Overviews increased clicks to external sites. The same study found people assigned to AI Mode ran fewer search sessions overall (Search Engine Journal). We've covered the wider implications of that research in Google's own data shows AI Mode cuts clicks to your website.

Publisher-level analytics tells a similar story. Chartbeat reported that Google search referrals to publishers fell 40.2% in a year, while AI chatbots sent just 0.01% of traffic, nowhere near replacing what search is losing. Search's share of those publishers' pageviews fell from about 9% in July 2024 to 5% in July 2026 (Technology.org).

Is Huffman right?

The honest answer is: directionally yes, categorically no. The Pew browsing data, the randomised AI Mode experiment and the Chartbeat publisher figures all point to fewer clicks reaching individual websites when AI summaries are present, consistent with what Huffman described for Reddit.

But Huffman's claim that AI Mode "does not drive traffic... not to anybody, as far as I know" is an absolute statement from one company executive, not a comprehensive measurement across the web, as one analysis of the October 2026 disclosures pointed out (Cornford and Cross). Google's aggregate-click defence doesn't resolve the publisher-level complaint either: overall click volume across the web can rise even as individual publisher click-through rates fall, because clicks are being redistributed, not necessarily created (Something Inc). Analyst Lily Ray has also argued that organic rank still drives most AI citations, suggesting ranking well still matters even if it no longer guarantees a click (Something Inc).

Our view: Huffman is describing something real for Reddit, and the independent click-rate data supports the broader trend he's pointing to. But treating his statement as proof that AI Mode drives zero traffic for every publisher goes further than the evidence, including Reddit's own, actually supports. Reddit hasn't even confirmed the cause internally.

The real limitation here is that nobody outside Google has full visibility into AI Mode's click behaviour at scale. Pew's study was a snapshot of US adults in March 2025. The randomised AI Mode experiment measured behaviour in a controlled setting, not open web traffic. Chartbeat's figures come from its own publisher network, not the whole internet. Until Google publishes a breakdown by feature and by publisher cohort, claims in either direction rest on partial data.

What publishers and founders should do about it

Google and other AI search surfaces are answering queries without a click more often than they used to, and that's unlikely to reverse. A few practical steps follow:

• Stop relying on last year's Google Analytics referral numbers as a proxy for visibility. Check the dedicated reporting now available in Search Console, covered in How do I find the Generative AI performance report in Search Console?
• Accept that being cited inside an AI answer is a different outcome from getting a click, and measure both separately, as explored in Being cited by AI isn't the same as getting recommended
• Watch how your brand performs across AI platforms individually rather than relying on one blended score, since engines disagree with each other more than most people assume, as shown in AI engines barely agree, so one blended visibility score hides the truth

If you want a baseline read on where you currently stand across Google, ChatGPT and other AI surfaces, Sited's free AI visibility scorecard is a reasonable place to start.

Frequently asked questions

Did Reddit prove Google AI Mode caused its traffic drop?

No. Reddit reported search referrals falling by more than 1,000,000 per week on average in October 2026, but the company has called Google AI "the leading part of its hypothesis" rather than a confirmed finding (Dealroom).

What does Google say about AI Mode and clicks?

Google's Nick Fox said its AI Search features send "billions of clicks to websites every week," and Liz Reid has said total organic clicks have stayed relatively stable year on year with higher click quality (Crawlvision, Technology.org). Neither figure breaks out AI Mode specifically.

Is there independent evidence that AI Overviews reduce clicks?

Yes. Pew Research Centre found a 47% lower click rate on searches with an AI Overview present compared with those without, based on real-world browsing data from 900 US adults (Forbes Advisor). A separate randomised experiment found AI Mode users clicked through to external sites substantially less often (Search Engine Journal).

Are AI chatbots replacing the traffic that search is losing?

Not according to Chartbeat's publisher data, which found AI chatbots sent just 0.01% of traffic to the publishers it tracked while Google search referrals fell 40.2% in a year (Technology.org).