Google opens 'Preferred Sources' button to publishers as AI cuts search traffic

August 24, 2026 · TechCrunch

Readers can now click a 'Preferred Sources' button embedded directly on a publisher's website to flag that outlet as one they want to see more often in Google Search, Discover and Google News. Google rolled out the feature on Thursday, extending an option it launched in May for AI Mode and AI Overviews, having previously offered it in Top Stories. The company said that as of that May launch, people across the web had already selected over 345,000 unique sources through the tool. Readers can also add favorites directly through Google's source preferences page by searching for a publisher by name or website.

Publisher traffic from search increasingly depends on whether readers have marked a site as a preferred source, since Google says a preferred source is twice as likely to get the click when it appears in results. Sites that embed the button and build reader loyalty stand a better chance of holding onto referral traffic as AI Overviews and AI Mode take a larger share of search queries, while sites that skip it risk losing visibility to competitors that add it. Google's parallel move to let readers retune their Discover feed and audio briefings with natural language commands adds another lever publishers and content platforms will need to track when gauging where audience attention lands.