Back in November 2021, it began sending some searchers to translated versions of webpages through the search results. Google then in May 2022 started to report on how often this happened within Search Console. So when I saw a Google representative say they are looking into an "issue" around this and "currently investigating it" I raised my eyebrows.
A thread on Reddit complains about this behavior - the person who posted wrote:
When Google's display language is set to Vietnamese, upon clicking on some English results they will be redirected to Google Translate instead. I didn't turn on this feature nor there is a way to turn it off. I didn't ask for this. Also please return the traffic to the original websites. They did the hard work, not you Google.
He also shared a video of this happening:
From what I understand, this is normal behavior but a Google support representative responded:
Thank you for bringing this to our attention. We're aware of the issue you've described and want to assure you that our team is currently investigating it.
Dwayne Cubbins who reported on this first and notified me of this on X shared that there has been an increase in this Google behavior.
He cited Metehan Yesilyurt who posted details of this weeks ago on X:
1️⃣ In countries where local-language content is thin, Google is now injecting translated English pages (via Google Translate) directly into AI Overviews (AIOs).
— Metehan Yesilyurt (@metehan777) May 27, 2025
These links don’t go to the original site. They route through Google’s https://t.co/x4YV4y8hLz domain — a proxy layer. pic.twitter.com/cfQFLsADcy
Metehan shared it with me then and I had it in my newsletter, I just thought this was normal behavior. You can see his full write up over here.
So maybe Google is now looking into this as an issue or maybe the Googler who replied didn't know this is not a bug but a feature?
I am not sure.
Forum discussion at Reddit.
Update: This may have been fixed already for some time according to Glenn Gabe:
Google implemented a change to fix the translate situation where it was driving traffic to its own subdomain versus the third-party site. This is what @erik_sarissky and @patrickstox were talking about a few weeks ago. Glad Google fixed that... it wasn't right. pic.twitter.com/kxuSkHjz6d
— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) June 20, 2025
