Semrush, an Adobe company, has released its 2026 AI Visibility Index, introducing its first dedicated UK benchmark. The report compares AI search visibility across the UK and US, highlighting differences in brand mentions and cited sources. It also shows that visibility on one AI platform does not guarantee visibility on another.
This paper is an analysis of seven months of data from January to July 2026. This analysis covers ChatGPT, Gemini, and Google AI Mode using monthly data sets containing 2.5 million UK queries and 25 million US queries. Besides, this analysis considers the results obtained using Google AI Overviews for actual search keywords.
In terms of agreement on leading brands and sources during the period of analysis, AI platforms had more disagreement in the case of the UK. Two platforms overlapped in 63 to 70 out of their 100 most mentioned brands in the UK. In contrast, the overlap in the US was 70 to 78 brands.
UK AI Search Visibility Shows Greater Fragmentation
The report identifies 24 UK domain records within its Universal Core, compared with 36 in the US. Only 15 domains appeared in both markets, including Adobe, Apple, Amazon, Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft, Reddit, TikTok, and YouTube.
Moreover, six of the nine UK-specific domains belonged to retail or ecommerce brands. These included Amazon UK, Argos, Asda, eBay UK, Marks & Spencer, and Tesco. BBC, Nike, and TripAdvisor UK completed the group.
“For enterprise brands, brand and AI visibility is a global concern. And with every additional market comes additional complexity. Brands need to optimize their own content for the audiences, questions, and expectations of each market, while also building the right third-party signals around them.” Marissa Dacay, Global Vice President, Enterprise Marketing, Adobe
Independent sources were also an issue emphasized by the research. News sources from the UK were cited 29.5% in ChatGPT’s 100 top cited UK domains. This statistic in the US was 19.6%. At the same time, news sources were the main category for Gemini in the UK.
Brand Mentions and Citations Deliver Different Results
Semrush found that fewer than half of the top 100 mentioned brands also ranked among the top 100 cited domains. In the UK, monthly overlap ranged from 36.7 to 45.3 domains.
For example, Tesco and Asda consistently appeared among the leading mentioned brands. However, their citation rankings differed significantly across platforms.
“AI is now a decision layer for customers, changing how they discover brands, sort through options and ultimately purchase. That makes visibility a business and commercial growth issue, not only a search issue. The sources and brands that shape decisions in the UK are not identical to those in the US, and teams need to build for those differences while keeping brands consistently discovered, evaluated and chosen wherever AI is shaping the decision.” Andrew Warden, Global Vice President of Marketing and CMO of Semrush, An Adobe Company
Moreover, the findings from Adobe’s data referenced in the report show that AI-referred visitors have a 60 percent better conversion rate compared to those who are not referred to via AI. In addition, they earn 53 percent more revenue per visitor. All in all, the report suggests that brands consider measuring their AI Visibility Index based on markets, platforms, and industries.
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News Source: Businesswire.com
