GOOGL Infuses AI to Boost Search Dominance: What's the Path Ahead?

Alphabet’s GOOGL Google continues to dominate the Search business, handling over 5 trillion queries annually, as per Semrush. The company has been actively embedding AI, especially within Search, to enhance user experience, provide better AI-focused features and consequently improve ad performance. Google accounts for 89.66% market share, followed by Microsoft’s MSFT Bing with 3.88% share.

In the recently announced second quarter of 2025, Google Search and other revenues increased 11.7% year over year to $54.19 billion, surpassing the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 3.04% and accounted for 56.2% of total revenues. Overall queries and commercial queries on Search continued to grow year over year in the reported quarter. 

Alphabet is advancing visual and contextual search capabilities. The Circle to Search feature is now active on more than 300 million devices. The company is adding functionalities to help people explore complex topics and ask follow-up questions without switching apps. For instance, gamers can now use Circle to Search while playing mobile games to see an AI Overview or answers.

AI Overviews now reach more than 2 billion users per month and are available in over 200 countries across 40 languages. It is now driving over 10% more queries globally. Powered by Gemini 2.5, AI Overviews currently delivers the fastest AI responses in the industry. The combination of lens or Circle to Search, together with AI Overviews, is driving multimodal search usage. 

Google’s AI-powered Search features are driving deeper engagement, with AI Mode offering advanced reasoning and multimodal responses. Users are generating queries twice as long as those in traditional searches. The launch of AI Mode in the United States and India — where it currently has more than 100 million monthly active users — is expected to drive further growth.

GOOGL Faces Tough Competition in Search Market

Alphabet faces stiff competition from Microsoft and Baidu BIDU.

Microsoft is strengthening Bing with the rollout of Copilot Search, which brings the full power of Copilot’s AI into the search experience. The feature delivers intelligent summaries for complex queries, helping users save time in uncovering relevant information. Microsoft’s Bing is shifting from passive searching to action-oriented assistance, helping users complete real-world tasks like booking appointments, getting service details and many more.

Search giant Baidu, known as the Google of China, is upgrading its Ernie-powered search engine to be smarter by adding AI, voice and image capabilities. Baidu’s Search engine is now competing for user attention against social platforms and AI-native browsers, shifting focus from traditional keyword inputs to natural language queries and voice-based searches in multiple Chinese dialects.

GOOGL’s Share Price Performance, Valuation and Estimates

Alphabet’s shares have appreciated 1.5% year to date (YTD), underperforming the broader Zacks Computer and Technology sector’s return of 10.7%.

GOOGL’s Stock Performance

Alphabet’s stock is trading at a forward 12-month Price/Sales of 6.7X compared with the industry’s 5.26X. GOOGL has a Value Score of C.

GOOGL Valuation

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for fiscal 2025 earnings is pegged at $9.72 per share, up 1.9% over the past 30 days, suggesting 20.90% year-over-year growth.

Alphabet Inc. Price and Consensus

Alphabet Inc. price-consensus-chart | Alphabet Inc. Quote

GOOGL currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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