On June 1, 2026, Google Ads permanently deleted older historical reporting data as part of an updated data retention policy. The change went live without prominent in-platform notification, and many US advertisers are discovering the loss when attempting to access historical performance data they expected to still be there.

Google announced AI Max for Shopping at Google Marketing Live in May 2026 as the successor to Performance Max for e-commerce advertisers. For US retailers, this is the largest structural change to Google's shopping campaign infrastructure since Performance Max launched.

In July 2026, Google updated Search Console to show how content from social media and video platforms performs in Google Search results. For the first time, site owners can see data from a cross-platform perspective - measuring impressions and clicks not just from their own pages, but from their presence on YouTube, social platforms, and other content channels that appear in Google's search results.

For sites competing in the US market, Google Search Console is more complex to read in 2026 than it was two years ago. AI Overviews, featured snippets, and People Also Ask boxes now compete for screen space with standard organic results on Google.com, changing what CTR numbers at different positions actually indicate.

Google added dedicated AI performance reports to Search Console in June 2026, giving site owners a direct way to measure how their content performs in AI-generated search results. For the first time, you can see exactly how many times your pages appeared inside Google AI Overviews, how many clicks those appearances generated, and what your click-through rate from AI results actually is - separately from your regular organic data.