Dynamic Search Ads (DSA) are ads without keywords. Google reads your website, picks the search queries to show the ad for, and writes the headline itself. Many accounts still have such campaigns from long ago: someone launched them “for reach” and then forgot about them. Google has announced it is closing this format. Below: what exactly will change, what it risks, and what an owner can check alone before January.
Dates and wording were checked on 9 November 2026 against industry publications (PPC Land, Search Engine Land) and Google’s help. Where we did not see the original source, we say so directly.
What changes and when
Google announced the DSA shutdown on 15 April 2026. At that point the automatic migration was planned for September 2026. The date was pushed back: on 11 June 2026 the Google Ads Developer Blog reported it. According to PPC Land the schedule is now:
- January 2027: you can no longer create a new DSA campaign;
- February 2027: Google migrates the remaining active DSA campaigns automatically. PPC Land quotes Google: to Performance Max or “AI-powered Search campaigns”. The title of the Google page, which we did not open, mentions AI Max, so this article talks about AI Max.
The sources we read give no exact day in January or February, so do not plan for “by the 31st”; plan for “before the new year”. We could not open Google’s own announcement page (business.google.com) without cookie consent, so the dates come from industry publications. The date has already moved once, so check it in your own account: Google may change it again.
What AI Max is and how it differs
AI Max for Search campaigns is a set of features switched on top of an ordinary Search campaign. Two matter here: query matching wider than your keywords, and Final URL expansion (FUE). Google’s help explains that Google can send a click to a different page of your site than the one you specified, if it fits the query. In its words, Google “may replace your Final URL with a more relevant landing page”. The expansion works together with the Text customization setting: turn text customization off and Final URL expansion turns off too.
Now to what matters for an owner. In DSA, Google also picked the pages, but within the rules you set (the whole site or chosen sections). After the migration, per PPC Land, Final URL expansion is one of three AI Max features enabled by default, while legacy URL controls are “preserved”. Google’s own documentation is not consistent here: the interface says the expansion is on by default when you opt in, while the API docs say it defaults to off. So what your campaign gets, you will only learn in the account after the migration.
Why it matters
The practical risk is this: after the migration Google can send people not only to the pages you chose but also to pages it finds itself. For example, an old promotion that ended long ago, or a page without a phone number or form. You pay for the ad just the same. Separately, practitioners report cases where AI Max sent specific product queries to a generic manufacturer page instead of the right product page. Google has not addressed this, so it is a practitioners’ observation, not a confirmed fact for everyone.
There is another side too, and it is only fair to show it. Google presents AI Max as a way to find more relevant queries and adapt the text. We have seen no independent measurements on Ukrainian accounts, so we claim neither “it will be better” nor “it will be worse”. That is exactly why you should decide first, yourself.
There is protection against page replacement. Per Google’s help, Final URL expansion lets you set URL exclusions: pages the ad must not lead to. But exclusions work only while text customization and Final URL expansion are on. If you turn text customization off in the AI Max settings, Final URL expansion turns off too, and so does page replacement.
Look at the numbers first
In the accounts we manage there are three such active campaigns. Over 30 days two of them got no clicks at all, and the third produced 4 leads. The decision comes out different: the first two can be switched off since there is nothing to lose, while the third is better kept until December and prepared for the migration. Three campaigns is not statistics, only the experience of our own accounts. Your case may differ, so look at your own numbers.
What to check yourself. In Google Ads, open the campaign list and the ad groups. Dynamic ad groups have the type Dynamic in the interface, and the ads inside them have no headlines you wrote yourself, only a description. For each such campaign look at three numbers for the last 30 days: clicks, cost and conversions (leads and calls). If you have no groups of this type, the migration does not affect you.
What to ask your contractor, if they manage the account: “Do we have dynamic ads? How many leads did they bring in a month?” The answer should be a number, not “everything is fine”.
What to do
The decision depends on the number of leads.
- No leads: switch it off. A campaign that produced no clicks or leads in a month brings you nothing, and after the migration it will run under new rules you did not choose. Switching off is easier than sorting it out later.
- There are leads: move the queries to ordinary keywords before January. Open the search terms report of that campaign, find the queries that led to leads, and add them as keywords to an ordinary Search campaign with your own headlines and your own page. Then the migration will not touch you: you will not have to fight for control of the page after Google takes it.
- You keep DSA until the migration: write down the exclusions. If it pays to keep the campaign for a few more weeks, check before January which pages of your site must not appear in ads (an old promotion, a page without a phone number) and note them. After the migration they will need to go into the Final URL expansion exclusions.
A separate word about new campaigns: after January you cannot create DSA, and for those who want AI Max on purpose, Google’s help describes the setup. That is a different, deliberate deal: with a test, a budget and exclusions.
What we left out and why
- The separate September change (automatic migration of campaigns with automatically created assets and campaign-level broad match to AI Max). It is different in nature, and we found no page confirming it has been completed for Ukrainian accounts. We have not seen that setting in the accounts we manage, so writing “Google has already switched AI Max on for you” is not possible.
- Figures like “AI Max gives X% more conversions” from advertising materials. There is no independent verification for our market.
- Abbreviations from glossaries such as PPC Hero: that is a dictionary, not a news source.
Summary
Dynamic Search Ads are closing: from January 2027 there will be no new ones, and from February Google migrates the existing ones itself. The date has already been moved once. The main danger for an owner is not the migration itself but the replacement of the pages the ad leads to. So before January do three things: find such campaigns, look at their leads over 30 days, and decide: switch off, or move the queries into ordinary keywords. What else Google switches on without being asked, we covered in “What Google Ads Turns On by Itself: 5 Settings and What to Ask Your Contractor”. How we build ordinary campaigns is in the search advertising section.
Not sure what is in your account? Want a free audit of your Google Ads account? Send us a request — we will look at your account and tell you whether it has dynamic ads and what to do with them.