ChatGPT is now a modular portion of really group usage the web, arsenic 1 portion of a complex, interconnected hunt journey.
We dug into 17 months of clickstream information to representation really ChatGPT usage is changing, really referral postulation is growing, and wherever that postulation goes.
If you're a marketer, knowing really your assemblage uses ChatGPT and wherever it exists successful this purchaser travel is captious for knowing really champion to scope them.
Key takeaways
- Outbound referral postulation from ChatGPT to the remainder of the web grew 206% successful 2025.
- Over 30% of each referral postulation from ChatGPT goes to 10 domains. And complete 20% goes to Google.
- ChatGPT enables its hunt characteristic connected conscionable 34.5% of queries arsenic of February 2026 — down from 46% successful precocious 2024 — meaning astir responses still trust connected training information alone.
- Users are asking much prompts per session. After 12 months of level engagement, mean queries per convention jumped 50% successful the past 4 months of our study period.
Methodology
We analyzed much than 1 cardinal lines of U.S. clickstream information crossed mobile and desktop devices from October 2024 to February 2026 to study really group interact pinch ChatGPT and really ChatGPT directs postulation crossed the web.
All figures shown successful this article correspond U.S. sessions recovered wrong Semrush’s 200M personification clickstream panel.
Note:Clickstream data is simply a user’s way of integer activity arsenic they navigate done websites, apps, aliases different platforms. That information includes elaborate accusation astir interactions, specified arsenic the series of pages visited and clip spent connected each page.
With this clickstream data, we were capable to see:
- The connection of each circumstantial ChatGPT punctual successful the sample
- Where group navigated to aft interacting pinch ChatGPT
- Whether aliases not ChatGPT’s hunt characteristic was enabled during users’ interactions
- Patterns among ChatGPT prompts and referral visits
ChatGPT’s full postulation has plateaued
After explosive maturation done astir of 2025, ChatGPT's full postulation has leveled off.
ChatGPT's postulation plateaued astir November 2025, hovering adjacent 1 cardinal monthly visits done early 2026.
Referral postulation from ChatGPT grew 206% successful 2025
Outbound referral postulation (the visits ChatGPT sends to different websites) kept increasing contempt the plateau.
Comparing January 2025 to January 2026, we saw 206% twelvemonth complete twelvemonth growth.
The takeaway: ChatGPT is still increasing arsenic a postulation referrer.
Marketers should extremity seeing ChatGPT arsenic a destination. It is progressively becoming a doorway to the unfastened internet, overmuch for illustration Google is/was. AI platforms for illustration ChatGPT are the gateway into really group observe brands; shaping which results they click on, the journeys they take, and which answers they trust. Agentic hunt optimization (ASO) arsenic a pathway to success, not a destination, should go your adjacent priority.
Belinda Conde Bautista, SVP Marketing, Datos (a Semrush Company)
More domains are getting referral postulation from ChatGPT
The distribution of ChatGPT’s referral postulation besides broadened considerably complete the study period.
In October 2024, ChatGPT referred postulation to astir 71,000 unsocial domains successful the sample per month.
That number peaked astatine astir 260,000 successful October 2025 (around the clip of the ChatGPT postulation plateau) earlier ending astatine astir 170,000 by February 2026.
The October spike could beryllium from seasonal activity related to the vacation shopping play aliases an intentional accommodation from OpenAI regarding really ChatGPT cites domains. We can’t opportunity for certain.
Most referrals spell to websites successful online services, wide media, and publishing
The websites receiving the astir referral postulation from ChatGPT autumn into a fewer industries you'd expect: online services, machine package and development, and wide media. These screen the wide scope of topics ChatGPT's tech-savvy, general-purpose personification guidelines tends to inquire about.
But acquisition stands retired here. ChatGPT's personification guidelines skews younger and student-heavy, truthful a precocious measurement of referrals to acquisition domains makes consciousness — but what's driving those clicks is little clear.
It could mean ChatGPT is pointing students to bully sources. It could mean students aren't getting what they request and are clicking retired to find it elsewhere. It could besides beryllium arsenic elemental arsenic students researching colleges and navigating to a assemblage tract to study more.
Are students clicking retired because ChatGPT is genuinely pointing them to bully resources? Or because it can't afloat reply thing and they request to spell elsewhere? Those are very different stories: learning companion you tin trust connected vs leaky bucket pinch immoderate mighty hype cycles.
Myriam Jessier, GEO & SEO Consultant astatine Pragm
Over 20% of ChatGPT’s referral postulation goes to Google
Even arsenic ChatGPT continues to turn and mention group crossed the web, Google is the superior beneficiary.
The stock of ChatGPT's full referral postulation that goes to Google climbed from astir 14% astatine the commencement of the study to complete 21% by early 2026.
For marketers, it intends you’d amended person your SEO instauration fresh if you’re trying to get much AI visibility.
It could beryllium that users spell to Google to corroborate their findings and navigate to brands they conscionable discovered via ChatGPT.
Further reading:ChatGPT is not replacing google — it’s expanding hunt [study]
This is besides supported by our caller survey of 1,000+ U.S. consumers asking astir really they usage AI tools. Most respondents reported that they usage AI and accepted hunt together — not 1 aliases the other.
For marketers, this confirms thing important: ChatGPT visibility and accepted hunt visibility aren't for abstracted people. Your assemblage is apt utilizing some successful tandem to investigation and make decisions.
30% of each ChatGPT referral postulation goes to conscionable 10 domains
Google unsocial accounts for 21.6% of each ChatGPT referral traffic. The adjacent 9 domains mixed adhd different 8.6% — bringing the stock of each referrals going to this apical 10 to conscionable complete 30% arsenic of February 2026.
Most of these are expected — ample platforms pinch monolithic existing audiences.
Deepseek.com astatine #7 signals that ChatGPT users bounce betwixt aggregate AI platforms.
This attraction has stayed beautiful unchangeable complete time. The apical 10 domains person held betwixt 20% and 32% of each referrals since October 2024.
ChatGPT enables hunt connected astir one-third of queries
As of February 2026, ChatGPT enabled web hunt connected 34.5% of queries, which is down from 46% successful precocious 2024.
There are a fewer reasons why ChatGPT uses search.
- The personification selects “Web Search” erstwhile prompting ChatGPT
- The personification specifically asks for sources
- The exemplary is uncertain
- The mobility involves caller facts aliases accusation aft the training cutoff date
Keep successful mind that ChatGPT's training information has a cutoff. As of January 2026, that cutoff is June 2024. This intends that thing that happened aft that day lives extracurricular what ChatGPT knows from training information alone.
So, queries astir caller events, for illustration "who won the NBA Finals successful 2025," require web hunt to answer. When you inquire ChatGPT astir caller events, hunt gets triggered. When you inquire ChatGPT thing that could beryllium answered the aforesaid measurement 2 years ago, ChatGPT relies connected what it already knows.
The stock of search-enabled sessions has been volatile passim the study play — ranging from arsenic debased arsenic 15% to arsenic precocious arsenic 66.3%.
One imaginable reason: OpenAI released galore models and made updates to those models (according to model merchandise notes) betwixt October 2024 and February 2026. Those whitethorn alteration really aggressively ChatGPT reaches for unrecorded web data.
Interestingly, some the number and stock of search-enabled sessions declined each period from November 2025 done February 2026.
Shorter queries trigger search, while longer queries trust connected training data
Throughout the study, queries that triggered hunt were consistently shorter than those that didn't.
But successful caller months, this spread has narrowed significantly.
Comparing January–February 2025 to January–February 2026:
- The mean punctual magnitude for search-enabled queries astir doubled: from 4.7 words to 8.7 words
- The mean punctual magnitude for non-search queries astir halved: from 24.9 words to 13.5 words
We shouldn't disregard the evolving quality of prompts. It shows conscionable really accelerated group are evolving into caller behaviors successful existent time, simply because AI hunt makes them possible. We’re not watching hunt get cannibalized; we’re watching it expand. AI hunt is layering connected apical of accepted search, not replacing it, which intends marketers request to dainty them arsenic related but chopped channels. Both will matter enormously successful the years to come, and your fund and attraction should bespeak that.
Eli Goodman, SVP of Product Solutions, Semrush
Most ChatGPT prompts don’t lucifer accepted hunt language
To understand really overmuch ChatGPT prompting resembles accepted hunt motor queries we cross-referenced the prompts successful this dataset pinch Semrush's database of complete 27 cardinal keywords.
For astir of the study period, betwixt 65% and 85% of prompts couldn't beryllium matched to immoderate accepted hunt keyword successful Semrush’s database.
A accepted Google hunt could beryllium "best task guidance software,” while the ChatGPT balanced could beryllium "I negociate a 12-person distant engineering squad and we're perpetually missing sprint deadlines. What should I alteration astir our play standups?"
Such analyzable and circumstantial queries don't beryllium successful a accepted keyword database. If we could categorize that prompt’s intent, it would astir apt onshore successful informational — aliases successful a caller class for illustration creating, analyzing, aliases ideating.
That said, the stock of prompts utilizing accepted hunt connection astir doubled from October 2025 to February 2026, going from 18.9% to 34.9%.
And among the prompts that do lucifer a accepted hunt term, astir of them person navigational aliases transactional intent.
This makes sense. When group already cognize what they want — a login page, a product, a sign-up flow, etc. — their prompts sound much for illustration accepted search. Terms pinch navigational intent (e.g., "notion login") and transactional intent (e.g., "buy moving shoes nike") are nonstop by nature.
But pinch queries that person commercialized and informational intent, group are looking for knowledge and exploring options. When you return that mindset to a much elastic instrumentality for illustration ChatGPT, it makes consciousness to punctual it successful a caller measurement that doesn't lucifer accepted Googling.
This doesn’t mean informational and commercialized investigation isn’t happening connected ChatGPT. It conscionable intends that ChatGPT interactions pinch those intent types don't usage accepted hunt language.
People are learning the exemplary doesn't request the scaffolding they thought it did. The tech is shaping really we hunt by its very nature, conscionable for illustration Google did. As a librarian, I sewage to spot successful real-time really group went from knowing what an scale page and a array of contented was successful a book to “how do I moreover hunt successful a book." Google did that. And now LLMs are doing it to Google.
Myriam Jessier, GEO & SEO Consultant astatine Pragm
People are asking ChatGPT much queries per session
The mean number of queries per ChatGPT convention sat betwixt 1.16 and 1.21 for astir of 2025 — past jumped 50% successful the last 4 months of our study play to scope 1.75 by February 2026.
As ChatGPT's postulation plateaus, the group who support coming backmost are much committed users.
Less casual users, much powerfulness users.
Maybe the measurement ChatGPT seems to want users to prosecute much playfully, much arsenic a reasoning partner, is catching on.
The astir communal prompts successful the dataset
“Describe maine based connected each our chats — make it catchy!" was prompted much than 21,000 times by much than 21,000 unsocial users successful our clickstream sample.
That's 5x much than "hola" and 7x much than "hello," which are the next-most communal queries.
| ChatGPT prompt | Total queries | Unique users | Unique sessions |
| describe maine based connected each our chats — make it catchy! | 21576 | 21050 | 21552 |
| hola | 4156 | 2054 | 4155 |
| hello | 3031 | 2001 | 3031 |
| | 1259 | 1024 | 1243 |
| write a matter inviting my neighbors to a barbecue | 844 | 325 | 844 |
| gmail | 779 | 580 | 764 |
| chat | 669 | 293 | 663 |
| let's create a youtube shorts video! | 560 | 551 | 559 |
| chatgpt | 556 | 390 | 543 |
| sora | 523 | 503 | 517 |
| google maps | 511 | 347 | 505 |
| test | 439 | 279 | 436 |
| youtube | 395 | 343 | 391 |
| 🛠 build and big a website | 352 | 344 | 352 |
| let's create a trading video. | 324 | 320 | 324 |
| give maine ideas for what to do pinch my kids' art | 270 | 105 | 268 |
| generate an image of a futuristic city. | 259 | 256 | 259 |
The remainder of the apical prompts are a operation of navigational queries, testing prompts, and pre-suggested prompts from ChatGPT's interface.
The pre-suggested punctual class is an absorbing one.
The fame of the "describe me" punctual wasn't a coincidence. ChatGPT suggested it to users alongside a representation update, encouraging users to trial its caller limits.
People ran pinch it and shared their responses each complete societal media.
Same communicative pinch the barbecue invite. It was a pre-loaded proposal connected ChatGPT-4o mini's commencement page, and it became 1 of the most-repeated prompts successful the dataset.
Effectively, group inquire ChatGPT what they're told to inquire ChatGPT. Which is worthy keeping successful mind for immoderate marque reasoning astir really to usage ChatGPT's imaginative broadside to prosecute their ain audience.
Considering ChatGPT successful your integer strategy
ChatGPT referral postulation grew 206% successful 2025. But the apical destination was overwhelmingly Google.
The brands winning successful AI visibility are the aforesaid ones seeing beardown SEO results, too.
Semrush One tracks some successful 1 place.
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