Over the past few weeks, Google has been showing AI Overviews for local packs, leading some businesses to see huge drops in visibility for their Google Business Profile and local listings. Some businesses are seeing 50% declines or more because of the local pack change.
Joy Hawkins dug deep into this in a blog post named AI is Quietly Taking Over Local SEO! No One’s Ready for This and she has been sharing these findings on X for the past few weeks.
Here is an example, of a side-by-side, AI Overview replacing a local pack. On the left is the default new AI Overview, on the right is an account that does not get AI Overviews and it shows the normal local pack:
Here is an example Joy shared on X back on December 30th:
I've been tracking AI powered local packs. This horrible feature displaces/replaces the traditional 3-pack. In my write-up about this, I talked about how it's lowering traffic to Google business profiles while increasing clicks to ads.
— Joy Hawkins (@JoyanneHawkins) December 30, 2025
I thought it going down from 3 businesses… pic.twitter.com/4fIFhX2uJb
Joy wrote, "I've been tracking AI powered local packs. This horrible feature displaces/replaces the traditional 3-pack. In my write-up about this, I talked about how it's lowering traffic to Google business profiles while increasing clicks to ads."
That screenshot is from Joy's blog post showing how calls can significantly disappear when this happens.
"According to data from Places Scout, AI Local Packs are already appearing on roughly 8% of keywords (and rising)," she wrote.
Here is her video:
Yep, so AI Overviews are now killing local SEO in a big way...
Oh damn, @JoyanneHawkins is right. AI Local packs are showing up more and more. I just saw one -> AI is Quietly Taking Over Local SEO! No One’s Ready for This
— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) January 15, 2026
Here's the problem:
*Fewer Spots: They often show only 1 or 2 businesses instead of the usual 3.
*No Call Buttons: Many… pic.twitter.com/NHWzL0pAJO
Forum discussion at X.
