Branded Search
A branded search is a search that includes your business's name, a misspelling of it, or a product or service only you offer. Google uses that meaning for the branded queries filter in Search Console, which splits your search data into searches for you and searches for everything else.
Source: Google Search Central Blog, Introducing the branded queries filter in Search Console (Michael Huzman, November 20, 2025; updated March 11, 2026), checked October 29, 2026
What Branded Search means for your business
Google says an AI-assisted system sorts the searches, not a list of words you set, so some can land in the wrong pile. The filter only works for whole-site properties with enough searches, and it has no effect on rankings. If your name is also an everyday word, check a sample of what got sorted where.
The two piles answer different questions. Google notes that searches for your name tend to bring up your pages higher and get clicked more. The rest show whether people who don't know you yet are finding you at all. We'd track both over months rather than weeks.
In paid search, the same phrase means bidding on your own name in Google Ads. That's a separate decision. Everything here is about the free results.
If you can't tell whether new people are finding you or only the ones who already know you, how we read your name searches sits beside your calls in each quarterly report.
Last reviewed October 29, 2026. All terms
How AI answers it today
On October 29, 2026, Google's AI Overview mixed free results with paid branded ad campaigns, citing SEO tool blogs, YouTube and LinkedIn but not Google's own definition. ChatGPT cited nothing and said to filter Search Console by hand, without naming its built-in branded queries filter.
Our run through ChatGPT and Google's AI Overview, October 29, 2026. A sample, not what every buyer sees.
Find out where your brand stands.
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