In September, Google started flipping switches in your ad account with Google AI Max, whether you touch them or not.
The Google AI Max upgrade goes compulsory in September 2026. Campaigns still running automatically created assets or campaign-level broad match get auto-upgraded to AI Max, Google’s AI-powered replacement for a decade of Search plumbing (Google, April 2026). You don’t get a vote. You get a notification.
Here’s the part almost nobody clocked.
In June, Google blinked on one deadline. Advertisers pushed back hard enough that the Dynamic Search Ads sunset got shoved to February 2027. But the September date for broad match campaigns and auto-created assets? Didn’t move an inch (Google, updated June 2026).
Read that again. Google gave ground on the old, dying product and held firm on the two settings sitting inside millions of live campaigns. That tells you exactly how badly they want this done before Q4.
A definition, so we’re arguing about the same thing: AI Max is a suite of AI features for Google Search campaigns (search term matching, text customisation and final URL expansion) that lets Google’s models decide which queries you enter, rewrite your ad copy, and choose your landing pages, steered by controls you set (or don’t).
What is actually changing in your account?
Three legacy tools are being absorbed. Dynamic Search Ads, the campaign type that built ads from your website content. Automatically created assets, which generated headlines on the fly. And campaign-level broad match, the setting that loosened your keywords across a whole campaign.
All three fold into AI Max. And when Google does the migration for you, it picks the settings.
DSA campaigns eventually get all three AI Max features switched on. Auto-created asset users get search term matching plus text customisation by default. Broad match campaigns get search term matching enabled automatically (Google, 2026).
Defaults chosen by the party that gets paid when you spend more. What could go wrong.
And this isn’t just Search anymore. On 24 July, Google switched on AI Max for standard Shopping campaigns (Search Engine Journal, July 2026). If you’re an ecommerce brand running Shopping alongside Search, the model is now reaching into both.
Should you fight the Google AI Max upgrade or get ahead of it?
The honest answer: fighting it isn’t on the menu. The February 2027 extension is a rollout schedule, not a reprieve.
So look at the actual evidence. Google’s own number is that AI Max with the full feature suite drives an average 7 per cent more conversions or conversion value at similar CPA or ROAS, versus running search term matching alone. Source: Google internal data, 2026. And note the fine print: measured on non-retail advertisers (Google, 2026).
That’s Google grading its own homework, on a cohort that isn’t you. It’s not nothing: hundreds of thousands of advertisers are already running AI Max, and the machine genuinely does find queries your keyword list never will. But a platform-reported average is a starting hypothesis, not a business case.
We’ve seen this movie on the other channel. When Meta pushed Advantage+ and then rebuilt its delivery system with Andromeda, the accounts that got hurt weren’t the ones that adopted. They were the ones that adopted with no inputs: no creative variety, no guardrails, no measurement. The machine amplifies what you feed it. Feed it nothing and it amplifies that too.
AI Max is the same bargain wearing a Google lapel pin. The targeting lever is gone. The controls are the strategy now.
There’s a consolation prize worth taking, too. The 2026 updates shipped with more transparency than Google has offered in years: asset-group reporting by creative theme, channel-level breakdowns showing where Performance Max budget actually lands, campaign-level negative keywords, and better placement exclusions (Groas, 2026). For years the deal was “give us control, get a black box.” The new deal is “give us control, get a window.” Not a fair trade. But a better one, if you actually look through the window.
Because here’s the structural truth about why this is happening. Because search behaviour has splintered into long, conversational, never-seen-before queries that keyword lists can’t cover. Because Google’s answer to AI-driven search competition is to make the ad system as automated as the results page. Because every advertiser hand-managing keywords is margin Google’s models think they can beat.
None of that is a conspiracy. It’s just incentives. Your job is to stop being the account that takes the default.
What you can do right now
1. Audit your exposure this week. Open every Search campaign and check two things: is campaign-level broad match on, and are automatically created assets enabled? Those campaigns transform in September. Most founders I talk to don’t know the answer for their own account. That’s the whole problem.
2. Upgrade voluntarily, in August, on your terms. Google’s upgrade tools port your settings and history across now, while you still choose the configuration (Google, 2026). Waiting for the auto-upgrade means accepting the default bundle. Moving first means you decide which of the three features run. This is the single highest-leverage hour you’ll spend in Google Ads this quarter.
3. Set the brand controls before the model writes in your name. AI Max ships with brand inclusions and exclusions, location-of-interest controls and text guidelines. You can tell it “we’re a premium brand, never mention discounts” before it generates a single headline. An AI rewriting ad copy for a considered $80 skincare product with bargain-bin language is a brand tax you never see itemised. Set the guidelines. In writing. Now.
4. Fence off your URLs. Final URL expansion will happily send paid traffic to your blog, your careers page, your out-of-stock graveyard. Use the URL controls to keep money pages in and everything else out. This was the classic DSA leak and it survives into AI Max fully intact.
5. Test it like you’d test anything. Google’s one-click experiments let you run AI Max against your current setup with a proper split (Google, 2026). Run it for four weeks. Judge it on your blended numbers, not the platform’s attributed ones. If it wins, scale it. If it loses, you now hold evidence. Accounts with evidence get to make decisions instead of taking defaults.
6. Watch the search terms report weekly through Q4. Search term matching means new query territory, and new query territory means new waste vectors. Fifteen minutes a week adding negatives is the price of letting the machine explore. In my experience with AU DTC accounts, the first fortnight after any automation change is where the junk shows up. That’s experience talking, not a study.
The September deadline lands ten weeks before BFCM. Brands that sort their AI Max configuration in August walk into Q4 with a tested setup. Brands that don’t will be diagnosing a forced migration in the middle of their biggest trading month.
One of those is a plan.
And a note for the Shopping-heavy accounts, because this is where most AU DTC budgets actually sit: the July change means your product feed just became your targeting. AI Max builds its query understanding from your titles, descriptions and landing pages, so a lazy feed (default Shopify titles, thin product descriptions, missing attributes) is now a targeting error, not a housekeeping issue. The week you spend enriching feed titles with the words customers actually search is worth more than any bid tweak you’ll make this quarter. Same logic as the Search controls: the model eats your inputs. Cook better inputs.
If you’d rather walk into Q4 with the tested setup, that’s the work we do: book a growth call and we’ll audit your exposure before Google decides for you.
FAQ
What is the Google AI Max upgrade? AI Max is Google’s AI-powered feature suite for Search campaigns, combining search term matching, text customisation and final URL expansion. From September 2026, Google automatically upgrades campaigns using automatically created assets or campaign-level broad match to AI Max. Dynamic Search Ads follow from February 2027.
When is the AI Max deadline? Auto-upgrades for campaigns using automatically created assets and campaign-level broad match begin in September 2026, per Google’s Ads & Commerce blog. The Dynamic Search Ads sunset was extended to begin February 2027 after advertiser feedback. Voluntary upgrades are open now.
Does AI Max improve performance? Google’s internal 2026 data reports an average 7 per cent more conversions or conversion value at similar CPA/ROAS using the full AI Max suite versus search term matching alone, measured on non-retail advertisers. Independent results vary by account. Test with one-click experiments before scaling.
Does AI Max affect Shopping campaigns? Yes. Google rolled out AI Max for standard Shopping campaigns on 24 July 2026 (reported by Search Engine Journal), extending AI-driven query matching and creative to ecommerce product ads.
