Early in August 2026, Search Engine Roundtable and then Search Engine Land documented a Google experiment spotted by PPC consultant Nayan Prakash on LinkedIn: certain words in a Search ad's description become clickable links, like a standard hyperlink. The click, however, leads to the same page as the ad's main headline, with no separate destination.
The facts
- The experiment was documented on 4 August 2026 by Search Engine Roundtable, which notes that it could not replicate the test, then by Search Engine Land, based on the screenshot shared by Nayan Prakash.
- Observed behaviour: certain words or phrases in a Search ad's description appear underlined and clickable, as keyword-rich anchors.
- Destination: in the examples observed, the link embedded in the description points to the same page as the main headline, with no different URL; Google has confirmed neither the mechanism nor a general rollout.
Is this the equivalent of sitelinks?
Not for now. A sitelink lets a single ad point to several different pages. Here, the underlined text and the main headline point to the same destination: the test adds a new click point inside the ad, and no new destination. The most interesting hypothesis remains that Google would automatically choose which phrase to underline according to the intent inferred from the query, which would give more visual weight to certain arguments in the description. None of this is confirmed.
This test belongs to a broader movement. AIxH's acquisition team is also following the automatic migration of many Search campaigns to AI Max, confirmed for 1 September 2026: Google is taking over campaign construction upstream, and is now testing a more dynamic presentation of ad copy downstream. The AI Max migration is confirmed; this test of links in descriptions is not, and nothing says it will ever become a product.
AIxH's view
This test is a reminder of a simple rule: every word in an ad counts twice now that Google also decides what to highlight. Our SEA agency in Luxembourg weighs every description with one phrase in mind, the one that would deserve underlining if Google put it in the spotlight tomorrow. You do not yet control which words Google will choose to underline; you still control the words themselves.