Google Ads in 2026: How to use the new AI features

How do you keep your campaigns visible while users are simultaneously searching, streaming, scrolling, and shopping? The current version of Google Ads addresses exactly this challenge by combining traditional campaigns with a new generation of Google AI.

In this article, you’ll learn how Google Ads is structured at the end of 2025, which products have changed, and how to use them strategically. Topics include Search with AI Overviews and AI Mode, visual formats like YouTube and Demand Gen, Performance Max, app campaigns, retail features in the Merchant Center, as well as new measurement and creative solutions.

The goal: You’ll understand how to use Google Ads today as an AI-driven ecosystem instead of just testing individual features. This allows you to allocate your budgets precisely, support the entire customer journey, and refine your own online marketing strategy.

What features does Google Ads offer today?

Google Ads today is less a single product and more a new generation of platforms. At its core is Google AI, which connects all campaign formats more deeply and offers you greater automation and more control options.

On the search results page, Google integrates traditional text ads with generative answers. Ads can appear in AI Overviews or in AI Mode, where users ask complex questions. At the same time, AI Max bundles many AI features for search campaigns, from data-driven targeting to dynamic text adaptation.

At the top of the funnel, YouTube and Demand Gen stand out with strong visual discovery. They combine AI-optimized delivery with high-reach inventories like Shorts, Connected TV, or the Google Display Network. Performance Max acts as an overarching campaign that covers all channels with a single AI logic.

The system is complemented by app campaigns, commerce features in the Merchant Center, new measurement tools like Meridian, and creative workflows in the Asset Studio.

Why will Google Ads still be important in 2026?

The platform matters because user behavior is changing permanently. People switch between devices, formats, and platforms before making a decision. With isolated campaigns, you quickly lose relevance and budget efficiency.

The new generation connects search intent, video usage, shopping signals, and app data into one AI-powered system. This allows you to plan across the entire customer journey—from the initial search impulse to the final conversion in the webshop or the app.

For your business, this means: less manual routine, more time for strategy. You focus on messaging, offers, landing pages, and overarching performance goals. Google AI takes over large parts of campaign delivery and optimization—as long as your data foundation is solid.

How Google Ads works in practice

Step-by-step instructions

1. Define clear goals and metrics
   Determine which KPIs truly matter—such as online revenue, qualified leads, app installs, or store visits. Set up conversion tracking properly and ensure that Google Analytics and Google Ads are correctly connected.
   
2. Modernize your data foundation and tracking
   Use a data manager to unify data from your website, app, physical store, and CRM. Implement modern tags and leverage solutions like Google Tag Gateway to ensure Google AI receives maximum signals—while respecting data privacy.
   
3. Plan your search strategy with AI Max and Smart Bidding
   Start with AI Max for Search to unlock broader audiences and search queries. Use Smart Bidding strategies like Target ROAS or Target CPA. Leverage Smart Bidding Exploration to test new traffic segments in a controlled way.
   
4. Use Performance Max for cross-channel reach
   Enhance your search strategy with Performance Max. Provide high-quality creatives, product feeds, and clear objectives. Then analyze channel reports and search terms to continuously improve landing pages, copy, and creatives.
   
5. Use YouTube and Demand Gen for discovery
   Plan your YouTube campaigns for Connected TV, Shorts, and classic in-stream ads. Add Demand Gen to deliver visual discovery across YouTube, Discover, Gmail, and Display. Use new campaign goals for customer acquisition and optimization scripts for clicks or conversions.
   
6. Expand retail features, Merchant Center, and feeds
   If you sell products, maintain your Merchant Center account consistently. Use Brand Profile, product feeds, promotion info, videos, and generated assets from Product Studio. Through omni-channel bidding, you can optimize both online sales and in-store visits.
   
7. Connect app journeys and Web-to-App
   Link your web campaigns with your app using Web to App Connect and Web-to-App measurement. This helps you identify which campaigns truly drive app installs and valuable in-app events. Use target ROAS or Maximize Conversion Value to attract high-quality users.
   
8. Establish agentic tools and experiments
   Use Ads Advisor and Analytics Advisor as sparring partners. Ask questions in natural language, identify issues faster, and get concrete optimization suggestions. Supplement this with regular tests using Meridian and conversion lift experiments.
   

Tools in Google Ads

In Google Ads, rigid channel boundaries are disappearing. Key components include:

• AI Max for Search to further automate search campaigns and manage text variations using text guidelines.
  
• Performance Max as the central campaign format that unites Search, Shopping, YouTube, Discover, Gmail, and Display.
  
• Demand Gen to run visual, performance-oriented campaigns across YouTube, Discover, Gmail, and the Google Display Network.
  
• Merchant Center with Product Studio, brand tools, and priority fixes for a visible, consistent product presentation.
  
• Analytics, Data Manager, and Meridian to accurately analyze attribution, budget allocation, and incrementality.
  
• Asset Studio with Nano Banana Pro to quickly adapt, test, and share creatives with teams.
  

Opportunities and risks of Google Ads in 2026

What opportunities will Google Ads offer in 2026?

The greatest opportunity lies in the combination of automation and control. You reach more users at relevant moments while Google AI optimizes bids, placements, and asset combinations. At the same time, new reports, negative keywords, and demographic and device targeting still provide precise control options.

What risks should you be aware of?

Where more automation develops, the risk of opacity and dependency grows. If you let campaigns run without maintaining data quality, landing pages, and creatives, you waste potential. There is also always a risk that AI models may prioritize short-term goals over long-term brand impact.

How do you handle measurement and data protection?

Measurement remains the foundation of every AI optimization. Without clean signals, Google AI makes poorer decisions. At the same time, you must comply with data protection requirements and choose solutions that safeguard personal data. Modern tools like Data Manager, Google Tag Gateway, and Meridian help bring both sides together.

How do you maintain strategic control?

Use artificial intelligence as an amplifier, not an autopilot. Define clear goals, budgets, audience priorities, and creative guidelines. Test different strategies through experiments and value analyses. This way, you actively use Google Ads instead of relying on standard recommendations.

The future of Google Ads

The Google advertising platform is clearly moving toward agentic systems. Ads Advisor and Analytics Advisor are early steps where AI not only analyzes data but also proactively provides suggestions and supports workflows.

In the future, you will manage campaigns less through individual levers. Instead, you will define business goals, data sources, guardrails, and creative frameworks. Agentic systems will then plan campaigns, automatically test variations, and report back only the most important decisions to you.

At the same time, the connection between channels is becoming tighter. The boundaries between search ads, video, shopping listings, and app placements continue to blur. For you, this means your strategy must work across channels, and your content must perform everywhere. This is exactly where a solid foundation in online marketing pays off.

Conclusion

Google Ads transforms an ad tool into an AI-powered marketing ecosystem. If you bring clear goals, strong creatives, and a solid data foundation, you can seamlessly connect search, video, shopping, and app campaigns and demonstrate real added value.

It’s important that you manage automation consciously. Use AI Max, Performance Max, Demand Gen, Merchant Center, measurement tools, and Asset Studio, but back them up with clean tracking, experiments, and clear business rules.

If you want to set up Google Ads strategically today, we at Media Beats guide you from analysis and concept development to ongoing optimization. Start your project with us now and turn Google AI into measurable growth instead of a black-box experiment.

Sources:

Published by the Google Ads team:

1. Google Internal Data, Global, March 11, 2025 to April 11, 2025

2. Google Internal Data, February 2025 – March 2025

3. Google Internal Data, Global, Finance, July – Dec 2024 vs Jan – June 2025