Last Updated on August 27, 2026
Google is changing settings inside live ad accounts on 1 September. The businesses most exposed are the ones who ticked a box two years ago and have not opened the campaign since.
What Google actually announced
On 15 April 2026, Google said three legacy Search settings would automatically upgrade to AI Max, its bundled automation layer. Those settings were Dynamic Search Ads, automatically created assets, and the campaign-level broad match setting.
On 11 June, Google added an update to the same post. Dynamic Search Ads got a reprieve until February 2027. The other two did not.
Google’s public wording is “starting in September”. PPC Land, reporting on an email Google sent advertisers on 5 August 2026, puts the date at 1 September.
If your account never used either setting, nothing changes. If it did, something changes without you doing anything.
The mistake most businesses make
Owners treat every automation toggle in Google Ads as the same kind of decision. It is not.
Automatically created assets decided what your ad said. Google wrote headlines and descriptions from your landing page content. Irritating if you care about wording, but bounded.
Search term matching decides which searches your ad is allowed to enter.
Those are two different powers. One is copywriting. The other is where your click budget goes.
Per Google’s own post, campaigns using automatically created assets will be upgraded with search term matching and text customisation enabled by default. So an account that only ever agreed to automated ad copy inherits automated query expansion too.
| If your campaign uses | Search term matching | Text customisation | Final URL expansion |
|---|---|---|---|
| Automatically created assets | On by default | On by default | Not by default |
| Campaign-level broad match | On by default | Not by default | Not by default |
| Dynamic Search Ads | Delayed to February 2027 | ||
Source: Google Ads and Commerce Blog, 15 April 2026, updated 11 June 2026.
The number Google is quoting, and what it compares
Google’s post says AI Max campaigns using the full feature suite see “an average of 7% more conversions or conversion value at a similar CPA/ROAS” compared with using search term matching alone. The footnote calls it Google internal data from 2026, excluding retail advertisers.
Read that comparison again. It is not AI Max measured against your current setup. It is AI Max with everything switched on, measured against AI Max with one feature switched on. Both sides of that test are already AI Max.
That is not a reason to avoid it. It is a reason not to read 7% as a forecast for your account.
Independent testing has been less flattering. PPC Land has reported several agency-side analyses finding weaker results, including a November 2025 review of more than 250 retail campaigns that put AI Max conversions at roughly 35% lower ROAS than traditional match types. Those are practitioner analyses rather than published studies, and retail is not most UK small businesses. Treat both sets of numbers as claims, not settled fact.
Why this hits harder if your budget is tight
Search term matching widens the pool of searches your ad can appear on. It does not widen your budget.
If you already spend your daily budget by mid-afternoon, entering more auctions does not find you more customers. It spreads the same money across a wider and less certain set of searches. Google’s own documentation warns that AI Max is not effective on budget-limited campaigns, and flags those campaigns in the interface.
That is the whole point in one line. Automation is not the problem. Automation stacked on a weak foundation is.
If you do not know your cost per lead, and you do not know what a lead is worth to you, then broader matching is not growth. It is a faster way to discover you were guessing. Our break-even lead prices for 12 UK trades gives you the arithmetic to check.
Five things to do before 1 September
- Find out if you are affected. Open each Search campaign and check whether automatically created assets or the campaign-level broad match setting is on. Most owners genuinely do not know.
- Check if the campaign is budget-limited. If it is, fix that before anything widens your matching.
- Read your search terms report for the last 90 days. If it already contains searches you would never willingly pay for, more matching will not fix that.
- Check your tracking template. Final URL expansion is not enabled by default in either of these upgrades, but it sits one toggle away, and fixed-destination tracking URLs can break under it.
- Decide on purpose. Upgrade now on your own terms, or switch the legacy setting off. Doing nothing is also a decision. It just gets made for you.
The sharp bit
The businesses that get hurt on 1 September will not be the ones who read the announcement. They will be the ones running a campaign nobody has opened since 2024.
So go and look at the settings. Then look at whether that campaign was ever actually profitable. If it was not, an upgrade will not rescue it, and September is a decent excuse to stop paying for it. If you are not sure what you should be spending in the first place, start with what UK sole traders and micro businesses actually budget for marketing, then work back to the campaign.
