DSA IS DEAD. Google Is About to Change Your Ads Whether You're Ready or Not.

There's a quiet bombshell sitting in your Google Ads account right now.

You may not have noticed it. Most business owners don't check their ad platform until something breaks. A spike in spend, a drop in leads, a call from a worried staff member. By then, it's already happened.

Here's what's happening.

On April 15, Google officially announced the death of Dynamic Search Ads (DSA). From September 2026, Google will automatically upgrade every remaining DSA campaign to something called AI Max. No opt-in required. No asking for your permission. If you don't act first, Google acts for you.

That should get your attention.

What were Dynamic Search Ads, exactly?

If you've been running Google Ads for a few years, you've probably got DSA somewhere in your account, even if you didn't set it up yourself.

The idea was simple. Instead of manually writing ads for every keyword you wanted to appear for, DSA would crawl your website, read the content on your pages, and automatically generate ads to match what people searched for. It was Google saying: "Don't worry. We'll figure out what you're selling."

For a lot of businesses, it worked. Particularly if you had a large website, a lot of services, or you simply didn't have time to build keyword lists from scratch. It was a blunt instrument, but a useful one.

Now Google is retiring it.

So what is AI Max?

AI Max is Google's new system for running Search campaigns, and it goes much further than DSA ever did.

Where DSA read your landing pages and matched ads accordingly, AI Max reads your landing pages plus your existing ad copy, plus your keywords, plus real-time signals about what a specific person is searching for in that specific moment. It then writes new headlines, picks the best page on your site to send people to, and decides which searches to show your ad for all on the fly.

Think of DSA as a junior employee who read your brochure once and did their best. AI Max is a system that rewrites your ads, chooses your landing pages, and expands your audience without you seeing any of it until after the click has been paid for.

It's more capable. It's also more opaque.

Why this matters more than Google is letting on

Here's what the official announcement says: AI Max delivers 7% more conversions at a similar cost compared to traditional search term matching.

Seven percent sounds like a reasonable trade. But here's what the independent data says.

One analysis tracked over 30,000 search terms activated by AI Max features. Of those, 99% generated zero conversions. A separate study of more than 250 retail campaigns found AI Max delivered conversions at roughly 35% lower return on ad spend than traditional match types. Another advertiser documented a cost per conversion of $100.37 under AI Max versus $43.97 under phrase match over a four-month period.

Google's number and the real-world number are not the same number.

That doesn't mean AI Max won't work for you. It might. For some accounts, particularly ecommerce businesses with large product catalogues, it genuinely performs. But for service businesses, professional firms, lead generation accounts, the kind of businesses that make up most of my clients the picture is far less clear.

The problem isn't the technology. The problem is handing over control to a system without understanding what it's doing with your budget.

What actually changes in your account

Three things are getting upgraded automatically:

1. Dynamic Search Ad campaigns — converted to AI Max, with all three features switched on by default: search term matching, text customisation, and final URL expansion.

2. Automatically created assets — previously, Google might auto-generate some extra assets for your ads. Under AI Max, this becomes more systematic.

3. Campaign-level broad match settings — if you had broad match applied at the campaign level, AI Max will handle the matching logic instead.

The part that most business owners miss: these features are ON by default after the migration. URL expansion means Google can send traffic to any page on your site, not just the page you specified. Text customisation means Google can write headlines you didn't approve. Search term matching means your ads can appear for searches you'd never have chosen.

Unless you actively configure the guardrails — which requires knowing the guardrails exist, you're running the system wide open.

This is not Google being malicious. It's Google being Google.

Let's be fair here. Google genuinely believes AI Max performs better. For many accounts, it probably does. The platform is moving toward a world where automation handles more of the work, and for advertisers who feed the system well — strong landing pages, clean conversion tracking, quality creative assets,  that automation can be a genuine advantage.

But there's a pattern worth recognising.

Every time Google retires an old format and migrates advertisers to a new automated system, the default settings are configured in Google's favour, not yours. The default is more spend, wider reach, more AI involvement. The controls are available, but you have to know to look for them, and you have to configure them correctly.

Smart Shopping became Performance Max. Call-only ads are being retired. Now DSA becomes AI Max. The direction is consistent: fewer formats, more automation, less manual control.

That's not inherently wrong. But it means the job of a good ads manager has changed. It's no longer about building the perfect keyword list. It's about knowing which defaults to override, which AI features to trust, and where to keep a human hand on the wheel.

What you should do before September

If you have DSA campaigns running: Don't wait for the automatic upgrade. Migrate voluntarily now, during the transition period, so you can configure AI Max on your terms — not Google's defaults. The voluntary migration preserves your historical data and gives you control over which features are on or off from day one.

If you're not sure whether you have DSA: Log into Google Ads. Go to Campaigns. Filter by campaign type. If you see "Dynamic Search Ads" or any campaign using "dynamic ad groups," you're affected.

Whoever manages your ads: Ask them specifically what their plan is for the DSA migration. If they don't have an answer, that's your answer.

The guardrails to check: Once migrated to AI Max, review your URL expansion settings (you can restrict which pages Google can send traffic to), text customisation guidelines (you can specify up to 25 term exclusions and 40 messaging restrictions), and brand controls (you can prevent your ads appearing for branded searches you don't want to capture).

The bigger picture

Google is not asking for your opinion on this transition. The deadline is September. The automatic migration will happen. The only variable is whether your account gets configured deliberately or by default.

Most business owners will do nothing. Their accounts will migrate automatically, the default settings will run wide open, and they'll either get lucky or they'll spend the next three months wondering why their cost per lead went up.

The business owners who act now have an advantage. Not because AI Max is bad, but because understanding what changed and setting it up correctly is the difference between a system working for you and a system working for Google.

That's always been the game with paid advertising. The platform gives you tools. It's up to you, or the person managing your account to use them properly.

Concerned about how the DSA migration affects your Google Ads account? Get in touch and I'll take a look.