Google Forces Search Campaigns Into AI Max
On September 1, 2026, Google officially began automatically migrating eligible broad match Search campaigns and legacy Automatically Created Assets to its AI Max for Search format. This matters because this shift takes away your manual search term controls and alters how your conversions are attributed, meaning you need to act quickly to protect your measurement.
What changed
- On September 1, 2026, Google officially began auto-migrating eligible broad match Search campaigns to AI Max.
- Dynamic Search Ads migration is delayed until February 2027.
- You can no longer create new DSA campaigns.
Why it matters for your numbers
As media buyers, we rely on clean data to make budget decisions. This update changes the game for your attribution. When Google automatically shifts your broad match Search campaigns into the AI Max format, you lose the granular manual search term controls you used to have.
This means you can no longer easily see or control exactly which search terms are triggering your ads. Google's algorithm gets more freedom to decide where to show your ads and how to attribute those conversions. If the system decides to attribute a conversion to an automated placement or a search term that would have converted organically anyway, your platform-reported ROAS might look great, but your actual bank account won't reflect that growth.
Furthermore, the transition to AI Max can break your existing tracking templates. If your tracking templates are incompatible with the new format, your UTM parameters might fail, leading to lost or misattributed data in your analytics tools. With the Dynamic Search Ads migration delayed until February 2027, you have a brief window to prepare, but new DSA campaigns are already blocked, meaning the push toward automation is happening right now.
What I would do
- I am auditing every migrated campaign today to ensure our tracking and budgets are locked down.
- Review all AI-generated copy and assets that Google automatically created during the migration to ensure they align with your brand.
- Check your tracking template compatibility immediately to prevent your URL parameters and UTM tracking from breaking.
- Audit your broad match campaigns that were migrated on September 1, 2026, to see how their performance and search term quality have changed.
- Prepare your remaining Dynamic Search Ads for their upcoming migration in February 2027 so you are not caught off guard.
To keep your data clean, you need a tracking setup that does not rely on Google's self-reported numbers. At TrueROAS, we track what actually drives orders, server-side, independent of the ad platform's own numbers, ensuring you always know your true performance.
Source: Search Engine Land
If your numbers look off after this week, grab 20 minutes with me and we will look at your attribution together: Book a call with Rasmus.
