Google AI Overviews Cite User-Generated Content 27.8% of the Time vs 0.2% for ChatGPT

    27.8% of the sources in Google's AI Overviews are user-generated platforms such as YouTube, Facebook and Reddit, against 0.2% of ChatGPT's sources. Across five AI engines, about one citation in eight is user-generated, and most of it is video and social media, not forums.

    User-generated share of citations by engine
    Google AI Overviews
    27.8%
    Google AI Mode
    23%
    Gemini
    4.2%
    Perplexity
    2.9%
    ChatGPT
    0.2%

    Source: Suff Digital analysis of 164,629 cited URLs · answers from ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and Google's AI features, September 2026

    Share of AI citations by type of platform
    Social and video
    9.7%
    Forums and Q&A
    2.8%
    Blog platforms
    0.2%

    Source: Suff Digital analysis of 164,629 cited URLs · answers from ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and Google's AI features, September 2026

    Source: Google AI Overviews Cite User-Generated Content 27.8% of the Time vs 0.2% for ChatGPT - Suff Digital