What is AI advertising?
AI advertising describes two entirely different things, and they get conflated almost every time. One is placing ads inside AI answers, where Google has been running them for over a year and ChatGPT Ads opened in Sweden on 24 August 2026. The other is letting AI handle bidding, audiences and creative, which is already standard practice. This guide separates the two, shows where the ads actually appear, and explains what is worth paying for.
By Angelica Sandblom · Partner and specialist· Published · Updated Our view
A new ad surface is not the same as a surface worth funding. Judge the AI placements like any other channel: is the buying intent there, can you measure what the click leads to, does the margin cover the price? The newest option does not have to come first in the plan.
AI advertising means two different things.
The term covers two separate things that rarely get told apart, which makes the whole conversation muddier than it needs to be. The distinction is simple once someone points at it:
- Advertising in AI. The ad appears inside an AI-generated answer, when someone asks an assistant instead of reading a list of results. This is the new surface, and the one the headlines are about.
- Advertising with AI. The system picks bids, audiences and often creative for you, in campaign types like Performance Max or Advantage+. This is not new. It is already how most accounts run.
- The two overlap. Google's AI surfaces are sold through the same automated campaign types as everything else, so many advertisers already do both without calling it anything in particular.
The distinction is not academic. It decides what you actually have to do. Advertising with AI requires no new account, only someone who understands what the automation is optimising towards. Advertising in AI can mean a new platform, a new budget and new measurement. So when somebody says you should invest in AI advertising, the first question is which of the two they mean, because the answers lead in completely different directions.
Advertising inside AI answers.
The new surface is less new than the headlines suggest, and it is not a single place. Three players show ads inside AI-generated answers today, and they arrived in a particular order:
- Google got there first and remains the largest. Ads in AI Overviews, the summary at the top of the results page, have been running since 2025 across a dozen or so markets. In AI Mode, the conversational search experience, sponsored results appear in roughly one answer in four.
- OpenAI began a US pilot in February 2026, opened self-serve there in May, and brought ChatGPT Ads↗ to 31 European markets including Sweden on 24 August 2026. Ads are shown only to people on the free tier and Go.
- Microsoft is testing ads in Copilot. Meta has signalled but not launched, and the Gemini app was still ad-free in August 2026, even though Google has told advertisers that this will change.
Just as revealing is who says no. Perplexity↗ launched ads in late 2024, paused after less than a year and shut the effort down entirely in February 2026, citing user trust. Anthropic↗ keeps Claude ad-free as a stated position. The pattern is commercial rather than technical: ads turn up where there is a large free tier to fund, not where the revenue already comes from subscriptions. Worth remembering the next time someone calls AI advertising inevitable.
Where AI advertising appears today.
The surfaces differ more in how you buy them than in how they look. Four to keep track of, in descending order of reach:
- 01Google AI Overviews. Ads appear in and around the summary at the top of ordinary search results, and they are bought through your regular Google Ads account↗. If you run search campaigns today, your ads may already have appeared there without any deliberate decision on your part.
- 02Google AI Mode. The conversational search experience, where sponsored results turn up in roughly one answer in four. Same account, same campaigns. Google is also testing formats unique to this surface, among them offers aimed at clear purchase intent.
- 03ChatGPT Ads. Its own platform, its own account, its own budget. At the European launch, buying runs through OpenAI's sales team or through agency and technology partners, with self-serve promised later in the quarter. Bidding supports cost per thousand impressions, cost per click and conversion-optimised cost per click, and measurement uses a dedicated pixel plus a conversions API.
- 04Copilot and the rest. Microsoft↗ is testing in Copilot, Meta has announced but not launched. Reach is still too small to move a media plan in Sweden, but worth watching.
The practical conclusion surprises most people: the largest AI ad surface needs no new platform at all. It sits in the account you already have, and it has done for a while. The new platform is simultaneously the one that takes the most work to start and has the least reach in Sweden right now. That does not make it uninteresting, but it does make it something to test with a contained budget rather than somewhere to move half the media spend.
Advertising with AI, not in AI.
The second meaning already shapes your results, whether or not you have thought about it. In most accounts the machine already makes the bulk of the decisions:
- Bidding is set automatically against a goal you define, such as cost per conversion or return on ad spend. You control the goal, not the individual bids.
- The audience is partly chosen by the system. Campaign types like Performance Max at Google and Advantage+↗ at Meta go and find placements and audiences on their own, across surfaces you never listed.
- Creative is assembled by the system from the parts you upload, and tested against itself without you seeing every combination.
None of this is the future. It is how a modern account works. The risk lies not in the automation but in what it optimises towards. A system handed a poor goal becomes extremely good at reaching that poor goal, and it gets there faster than a person can notice. So the work moves upward: from adjusting bids to deciding what counts as a conversion, what data the system is allowed to see, and which outcomes are genuinely worth something to the business. Our guide to ROAS covers how that goal gets set.
What AI advertising changes for you.
Less than the headlines suggest in the short term, more than people expect over time. Three things are worth acting on now:
- Check where you already appear. If you run search advertising, you are probably already present in Google's AI surfaces. That is a reporting question rather than a buying decision, and it costs nothing to answer.
- Treat ChatGPT Ads as a test line. New surface, new measurement, untested audience in Sweden. Set a budget you can afford to lose, decide what you want to learn, and compare against a channel you already know.
- Insist that measurement holds up. An ad inside a conversation leaves a weaker click trail than an ad in a list of results. Without conversion tracking that works without third-party cookies, the evaluation becomes a feeling rather than a basis for decisions.
Appearing in AI answers also has an unpaid side. Being cited in an answer without paying for it is its own discipline, covered in our guide to AI search. The two belong together: one surface, two ways in, different cost profiles. If you want to know which surfaces deserve budget in your particular business, and what you are already paying for without realising it, see how Memorise works with advertising.
Get a review of where your ads actually appear.
Send us your web address and what you advertise today, and we will look at which surfaces you already reach, what the AI placements add in your particular category, and whether any budget is working towards the wrong goal. You get a concrete picture.
Write to us →Common questions about AI advertising
What is AI advertising?
The term carries two meanings. One is advertising in AI: the ad appears inside an AI-generated answer, as in Google's AI Overviews and AI Mode or in ChatGPT. The other is advertising with AI: the system handles bidding, audience selection and creative for you, as in Performance Max or Advantage+. The second meaning is already standard in most accounts. The first is the surface that has opened up over the past few years.
Can you advertise in ChatGPT in Sweden?
Yes, from 24 August 2026, when ChatGPT Ads opened in 31 European countries including Sweden. At launch, buying runs through OpenAI's sales team or through agency and technology partners, with self-serve promised later in the quarter. Ads are shown only to people on the free tier and Go, not to those paying for Plus, Pro or Enterprise.
Are we already advertising in AI without knowing?
Probably yes, if you run search advertising. Google's ads in AI Overviews and AI Mode are bought through the ordinary Google Ads account and require no separate decision, so your ads may have appeared in AI answers without anyone actively choosing it. It can be checked in reporting, and it is worth doing before you budget for new AI surfaces.
What does it cost to advertise in ChatGPT?
There is no fixed price. The platform supports payment per thousand impressions, per click and conversion-optimised cost per click, and the price is set by competition for the space. You control the budget, the market controls the unit price. Because the surface is new in Sweden there is no settled price picture to compare against yet, which is one reason to start at test scale.
Is AI advertising worth the money?
It depends on whether the buying intent sits where your customers actually are. You already reach Google's AI surfaces, so there the question is measurement rather than budget. ChatGPT Ads is untested in Sweden, and we never promise a particular return in advance. A sensible position is a contained test budget with a stated learning goal, evaluated against a channel you already know.