Query fan-out

Day 1: Crawling 14

Shown on screen 2

Said on stage 9

What Google's documentation says 2

Analysis by the author 1

Day 2: Indexing 7

Said on stage 3

What Google's documentation says 2

Analysis by the author 2

Day 3: Serving: Ranking, Search Console, and Performance 17

Shown on screen 2

Said on stage 10

What Google's documentation says 3

Analysis by the author 2

Across days and sessions 34

1. Stage D1-C208 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   AI Overviews and AI Mode may have extra processes of their own, like any other search feature, but the bulk of their processing is the same as for normal Search.

   extends
   Slide D1-C038 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   AI Mode and AI Overviews use the same crawling and the same index as Search. At serving they add grounding on the Search index and query fan-out.

2. Stage D1-C225 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   Google said query fan-out is nothing new: it fires, for example, ten different searches in the background, each a normal search on the same systems.

   extends
   Slide D1-C051 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   Three reasons were given: generative AI features are built directly on the core ranking systems, query fan-out expands the original query to find related information, and generative AI features highlight content indexed by Google Search.

3. Stage D1-C325 Day 1 · How crawling works

   Googlebot is the crawler Google uses for web search, including Search's AI features.

   extends
   Slide D1-C038 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   AI Mode and AI Overviews use the same crawling and the same index as Search. At serving they add grounding on the Search index and query fan-out.

4. Stage D1-C388 Day 1 · How Google thinks about crawl budget

   AI Mode is a feature that sits on top of Google's existing crawling infrastructure, so Google does not crawl a site more because of AI Mode.

   extends
   Slide D1-C038 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   AI Mode and AI Overviews use the same crawling and the same index as Search. At serving they add grounding on the Search index and query fan-out.

5. Stage D1-C412 Day 1 · Lightning session C: Crawling

   A community speaker described AI search as turning one query into many related searches, including searches in other languages, before the information is retrieved.

   extends
   Docs D1-C053 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   Query fan-out means running several related searches at once to gather more results; a question about lawn weeds may also search herbicides and weed prevention.

6. Analysis D1-C504 Day 1 · Lightning session A: Automation and AI

   The study cited on stage matches Peec AI's analysis (reported in February 2026) of over 10 million ChatGPT prompts and 20 million fan-outs: 43% of the fan-out searches for non-English prompts ran in English, and nearly 78% of non-English prompt runs had at least one English fan-out (from 66% for Spanish to 94% for Turkish), so the 43% is a share of fan-out searches, not of prompts.

   extends
   Stage D1-C294 Day 1 · Lightning session A: Automation and AI

   A community speaker cited a third-party study (heard as Peec AI's) finding that 43% of prompts produced fan-out queries in a language other than the one the user searched in.

7. Stage D2-C073 Day 2 · Controlling indexing

   John Mueller said Google uses the snippet as a way of building AI Overviews and AI Mode answers, so if a page forbids a snippet, Google cannot use that snippet for them.

   extends
   Slide D1-C038 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   AI Mode and AI Overviews use the same crawling and the same index as Search. At serving they add grounding on the Search index and query fan-out.

8. Docs D2-C074 Day 2 · Controlling indexing

   Google's AI features guide says a page must be indexed and eligible to be shown in Google Search with a snippet to appear as a supporting link in AI Overviews or AI Mode, with no additional technical requirements.

   extends
   Slide D1-C038 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   AI Mode and AI Overviews use the same crawling and the same index as Search. At serving they add grounding on the Search index and query fan-out.

9. Stage D2-C476 Day 2 · What is Structured Data and why we need it on the internet.

   The structured data Google processes is not fed very differently to AI Overviews and AI Mode: after cleaning and quality work, the same data goes to both the classic results page and the AI features.

   extends
   Slide D1-C038 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

   AI Mode and AI Overviews use the same crawling and the same index as Search. At serving they add grounding on the Search index and query fan-out.

10. Stage D2-C603 Day 2 · Focusing on Internationalisation and Localisation

    Users often assume AI is all-knowing and borderless, but AI is still language-dependent: if an AI answer is synthesized from the top results, a query in another language draws on a totally different set of data.

    extends
    Slide D1-C038 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    AI Mode and AI Overviews use the same crawling and the same index as Search. At serving they add grounding on the Search index and query fan-out.

11. Stage D2-C726 Day 2 · How does the index look like?

    AI Overviews and AI Mode use the same index structures and token-based snippets as classic web results, a point Google called important but not obvious.

    extends
    Slide D1-C038 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    AI Mode and AI Overviews use the same crawling and the same index as Search. At serving they add grounding on the Search index and query fan-out.

12. Stage D2-C727 Day 2 · How does the index look like?

    Google said that when AI Overviews or AI Mode run a query fan-out, the generated queries are sent to Google's Search index and documents come back with their snippets, which then feed the AI-generated answer (part of this passage is unclear in the recording).

    extends
    Slide D1-C051 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    Three reasons were given: generative AI features are built directly on the core ranking systems, query fan-out expands the original query to find related information, and generative AI features highlight content indexed by Google Search.

13. Stage D2-C727 Day 2 · How does the index look like?

    Google said that when AI Overviews or AI Mode run a query fan-out, the generated queries are sent to Google's Search index and documents come back with their snippets, which then feed the AI-generated answer (part of this passage is unclear in the recording).

    extends
    Docs D1-C053 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    Query fan-out means running several related searches at once to gather more results; a question about lawn weeds may also search herbicides and weed prevention.

14. Stage D2-C727 Day 2 · How does the index look like?

    Google said that when AI Overviews or AI Mode run a query fan-out, the generated queries are sent to Google's Search index and documents come back with their snippets, which then feed the AI-generated answer (part of this passage is unclear in the recording).

    extends
    Stage D1-C172 Day 1 · Welcome and opening keynotes

    Google said the Gemini model lets Search understand the user's intent, and query fan-out then adds further queries to the first one to enrich the quality of the answer.

15. Stage D2-C727 Day 2 · How does the index look like?

    Google said that when AI Overviews or AI Mode run a query fan-out, the generated queries are sent to Google's Search index and documents come back with their snippets, which then feed the AI-generated answer (part of this passage is unclear in the recording).

    extends
    Stage D2-C073 Day 2 · Controlling indexing

    John Mueller said Google uses the snippet as a way of building AI Overviews and AI Mode answers, so if a page forbids a snippet, Google cannot use that snippet for them.

16. Docs D2-C729 Day 2 · How does the index look like?

    Google says query fan-out in AI Overviews and AI Mode issues related searches across subtopics and several data sources, which for AI Mode include the Knowledge Graph and shopping data as well as web content (AI Mode launch post, March 2025).

    extends
    Docs D1-C053 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    Query fan-out means running several related searches at once to gather more results; a question about lawn weeds may also search herbicides and weed prevention.

17. Stage D2-C741 Day 2 · How does the index look like?

    In embedding-based retrieval, the distance between the embeddings of documents and the embedding of the user's query decides which documents are returned.

    extends
    Docs D1-C129 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    Google's guide says creating separate content for every variation of how people might search, including fan-out queries, primarily to manipulate rankings or AI responses violates its scaled content abuse policy. It adds that its AI systems can understand a page's relevance even without an exact match to the query.

18. Slide D3-C057 Day 3 · Making sense of users' queries

    Google's slide on how LLM features with grounding generally work showed a query going to both the search engine and an LLM, the search engine's results going to the LLM, the LLM generating fan-out queries that go back to the search engine, and the LLM returning answers with links.

    extends
    Slide D1-C038 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    AI Mode and AI Overviews use the same crawling and the same index as Search. At serving they add grounding on the Search index and query fan-out.

19. Stage D3-C059 Day 3 · Making sense of users' queries

    Google treats fan-out queries generated by the LLM the same way as queries typed by users, so understanding how normal queries work explains fan-out queries too.

    extends
    Stage D1-C172 Day 1 · Welcome and opening keynotes

    Google said the Gemini model lets Search understand the user's intent, and query fan-out then adds further queries to the first one to enrich the quality of the answer.

20. Stage D3-C059 Day 3 · Making sense of users' queries

    Google treats fan-out queries generated by the LLM the same way as queries typed by users, so understanding how normal queries work explains fan-out queries too.

    extends
    Stage D2-C727 Day 2 · How does the index look like?

    Google said that when AI Overviews or AI Mode run a query fan-out, the generated queries are sent to Google's Search index and documents come back with their snippets, which then feed the AI-generated answer (part of this passage is unclear in the recording).

21. Stage D3-C061 Day 3 · Making sense of users' queries

    Google tries to make fan-out queries distinct from each other for better coverage, avoiding asking the same question several times, which would return the same answers.

    extends
    Stage D1-C225 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    Google said query fan-out is nothing new: it fires, for example, ten different searches in the background, each a normal search on the same systems.

22. Stage D3-C061 Day 3 · Making sense of users' queries

    Google tries to make fan-out queries distinct from each other for better coverage, avoiding asking the same question several times, which would return the same answers.

    extends
    Docs D2-C729 Day 2 · How does the index look like?

    Google says query fan-out in AI Overviews and AI Mode issues related searches across subtopics and several data sources, which for AI Mode include the Knowledge Graph and shopping data as well as web content (AI Mode launch post, March 2025).

23. Stage D3-C063 Day 3 · Making sense of users' queries

    Google said fan-out queries are not added to Search Console, because Google considers them part of its infrastructure.

    extends
    Docs D1-C124 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    Google's launch post for the Generative AI performance reports in Search Console (3 June 2026; rolled out to all sites worldwide by 31 August 2026) lists impressions, pages, countries, devices (Search only) and dates, and no click or query metrics.

24. Stage D3-C065 Day 3 · Making sense of users' queries

    Because every system runs fan-out differently, Google advised understanding that fan-out happens but not overfocusing on individual fan-out queries or on how to rank for them.

    extends
    Docs D1-C129 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    Google's guide says creating separate content for every variation of how people might search, including fan-out queries, primarily to manipulate rankings or AI responses violates its scaled content abuse policy. It adds that its AI systems can understand a page's relevance even without an exact match to the query.

25. Stage D3-C212 Day 3 · How Google thinks about Quality

    Google's quality talk said Google clarified that traditional spam techniques aimed at manipulating AI responses also violate its spam policies, and that Google can take action against them.

    extends
    Docs D1-C129 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    Google's guide says creating separate content for every variation of how people might search, including fan-out queries, primarily to manipulate rankings or AI responses violates its scaled content abuse policy. It adds that its AI systems can understand a page's relevance even without an exact match to the query.

26. Stage D3-C325 Day 3 · How Search results are born

    AI Mode and AI Overviews are not rich results but standard search features: they need no structured data to function and work with the normal text results from Google's index.

    extends
    Stage D2-C726 Day 2 · How does the index look like?

    AI Overviews and AI Mode use the same index structures and token-based snippets as classic web results, a point Google called important but not obvious.

27. Slide D3-C701 Day 3 · Wrapping all up: AI, Search, and making sense of everything.

    Google's closing slide said AI on Google is just SEO: AI features on Google Search use exactly the same processes as traditional results, so no new acronym is needed, as none was for mobile-first indexing or structured data.

    extends
    Slide D1-C038 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    AI Mode and AI Overviews use the same crawling and the same index as Search. At serving they add grounding on the Search index and query fan-out.

28. Stage D2-C116 Day 2 · Lightning session D: Rendering and JavaScript

    AI Overviews and AI Mode are built on top of Search results: they are a different experience of the same content Google already has.

    repeats
    Slide D1-C038 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    AI Mode and AI Overviews use the same crawling and the same index as Search. At serving they add grounding on the Search index and query fan-out.

29. Stage D2-C601 Day 2 · Focusing on Internationalisation and Localisation

    Sites need no extra work to appear in AI Overviews and AI Mode: both work on top of the existing web results, so what works for web results also works for the AI features.

    repeats
    Slide D1-C051 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    Three reasons were given: generative AI features are built directly on the core ranking systems, query fan-out expands the original query to find related information, and generative AI features highlight content indexed by Google Search.

30. Stage D3-C056 Day 3 · Making sense of users' queries

    Google's generative AI features in Search build on the traditional ways of searching, so query understanding also flows into AI Overviews and AI Mode.

    repeats
    Slide D1-C051 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    Three reasons were given: generative AI features are built directly on the core ranking systems, query fan-out expands the original query to find related information, and generative AI features highlight content indexed by Google Search.

31. Stage D3-C058 Day 3 · Making sense of users' queries

    In Google's AI features, the query and the search results are additionally sent to an LLM, which returns new queries for Google to run.

    repeats
    Docs D1-C053 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    Query fan-out means running several related searches at once to gather more results; a question about lawn weeds may also search herbicides and weed prevention.

32. Stage D3-C702 Day 3 · Wrapping all up: AI, Search, and making sense of everything.

    AI Overviews and AI Mode are built on the Search infrastructure Google has used for 25 to 30 years and have very few processes of their own.

    repeats
    Slide D1-C038 Day 1 · How Search works and where's AI?

    AI Mode and AI Overviews use the same crawling and the same index as Search. At serving they add grounding on the Search index and query fan-out.

33. Stage D3-C702 Day 3 · Wrapping all up: AI, Search, and making sense of everything.

    AI Overviews and AI Mode are built on the Search infrastructure Google has used for 25 to 30 years and have very few processes of their own.

    repeats
    Stage D2-C726 Day 2 · How does the index look like?

    AI Overviews and AI Mode use the same index structures and token-based snippets as classic web results, a point Google called important but not obvious.

34. Stage D3-C704 Day 3 · Wrapping all up: AI, Search, and making sense of everything.

    Google warned that shiny new things, such as trying to work out fan-out queries, distract from the real mission of creating helpful content, since Search is just piping that connects users to information.

    repeats
    Stage D3-C065 Day 3 · Making sense of users' queries

    Because every system runs fan-out differently, Google advised understanding that fan-out happens but not overfocusing on individual fan-out queries or on how to rank for them.

Built on these claims 5

Developer requirements 3

• ShouldDocumentedDEV-AIF-03

  Structure content for readers instead of splitting it into small chunks for AI

  Rests on 9 claims, 4 of them in this topic

• MustDocumentedDEV-AIF-01

  Keep pages indexable and snippet-eligible, the whole technical requirement for AI features

  Rests on 5 claims, 3 of them in this topic

• AvoidDocumentedDEV-IDX-05

  Do not add nosnippet or a short max-snippet unless you accept losing snippets and AI feature use

  Rests on 6 claims, 2 of them in this topic

Myths 1

• DocumentedM-001

  Myth: SEO is dead: AI search needs GEO, a new discipline.

  Rests on 4 claims, 1 of them in this topic

Also instory angle A-001

Sources 11

• Optimizing your website for generative AI features on Google Search Google Search Central · checked 3 October 2026
• AI features and your website Google Search Central · checked 3 October 2026
• ChatGPT searches in English, even when you don't Press Peec AI · checked 4 October 2026
• ChatGPT Search Often Switches To English In Fan-Out Queries: Report Press Search Engine Journal (18 February 2026) · checked 4 October 2026
• Robots meta tag, data-nosnippet, and X-Robots-Tag specifications Google Search Central · checked 3 October 2026
• Expanding AI Overviews and introducing AI Mode Google blog (5 March 2025) · checked 3 October 2026
• Automatically generating and ranking results Google Search (How Search Works) · checked 3 October 2026
• Grounding with Google Search Google AI for Developers (Gemini API docs) · checked 3 October 2026
• What are impressions, position, and clicks? Google Search Console Help · checked 3 October 2026
• Introducing Search Generative AI performance reports in Search Console Search Central blog (3 June 2026) · checked 3 October 2026
• Web Guide: An experimental AI-organized search results page Google blog (24 July 2025) · checked 3 October 2026