AI’s growing influence on customer buying journeys is reshaping how shoppers discover and evaluate brands, with AI-referred traffic growing exponentially at the expense of organic search, says Contentsquare’s data.

New benchmarks in its 2026 Digital Experience report, which analysed over 99billion shopping sessions, showed that AI-referred sources have grown rapidly, rising +632% in Q4 2025.

Answers without clicks

While AI-referred sources only accounted for 0.2% of total traffic during the period, AI’s influence is already reshaping more established channels.

As AI Overviews deliver answers without clicks, organic search traffic declined by –9%, signalling a structural shift in how consumers discover, reach and evaluate brands.

“Brands now operate in a world of dual audiences – humans and AI agents… [and] that changes the rules,” said Jean-Christophe Pitié, Chief Marketing and Partnerships Officer at Contentsquare. “AI traffic is small but its intent signal is already outsized.”

Contentsquare’s data also showed that visitors influenced by AI are exhibiting higher levels of intent, evidenced in conversion performance. 

AI traffic conversion rates rose +55% year-on-year to 1.3%, as these sources begin to behave like more established, high-intent channels, such as traditional search.

Rising cost of attention

The report also showed brands are now paying more for fewer visits. Over the past three years, the cost of a single visit has risen +30% and just last year climbed +9%, even as overall traffic fell –4%.

Holding attention is also getting harder and visitors are becoming less forgiving.

On average, web visitors spend –7% less time on-site, underscoring how quickly journeys now succeed or fail as attention windows become shorter and tolerance for friction lessens.

“Success is defined by how quickly brands can detect experience gaps, friction and mismatches – and fix them before customers even notice,” Pitié continued. “Great customer experience is precise… and it’s built by removing small irritants until the experience simply works.”