What Is AFS? (AdSense for Search) – New Activity Criteria Starting August 20, 2025

What is AFS banner image with bold that describes Google AdSense for Search update to fit posts on AFS monetization and search advertising blogs.

AFS gives you an option to place a Google-powered search box on your site. Every time users search and click ads the money comes - Google keeps approximately 51 percent of the revenue to itself.

Why It is Awesome

• Super relevant Ads: ads by topic which are exactly what the people are searching, therefore their click-through rates are better.

• Improved user experience: The visitors can navigate to what they want easily and spend more time and lessen the bounce rates.

• Easy installation: All you need is to pick a code snippet in AdSense and paste it to your site you will not need any code-saving skills to install it.

Real Results

• Use the example of Mansion Review: they experienced a 50 percent revenue growth and a 10x growth in AFS revenue with the introduction of AFS in Aug 2021 within a month.

Quick To‑Do List

1. Add your site in AdSense then approval of your site then you would be done (How you would have been allowed since Mar 2024).


2. Adjust your search box in order to have it correspond to your site look.


3. Place a piece of code where the users can see it (e.g. against the header or sidebar).


4. Track and optimise through AdSense & Analytics.


5. Adhere to the guidelines of Google- in particular not giving incentives to clicks.

Who It is For

Ideal in sites with a lot of content or e-commerce websites where there are a lot of people seeking information regularly, i.e. blog sites, product directory or bigger stores.

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AFS Update: New Activity Criteria Starting August 20, 2025

Informative banner image - follows the question with answer strategy and is titled What is AFS? with the subtitle AdSense for Search Explained it is perfect for blogs about the Google AFS and monetizing strategies.

Google is restricting the policy of AdSense for Search (AFS). Beginning August 20, 2025 your AFS account should display a minimum of 20 Search ad impressions within 2 out of the previous 6 months. One may call this the "New Criteria" as Google calls it.

What does it mean?

Failing to attract sufficient search traffic, i.e. failure to attain 20 times of ad impressions in at least 2 distinct months over the previous 6 months, means you lose the services of AFS.

Why is Google doing this?

Google does not want AFS to be deployed to those sites that were built to be just on a high quality site with interaction with actual users. This is an update that clears clutter of non functional or low performance search boxes.

What should you do now?

• Ensure search box is visible, and helpful to visitors.

• Market information that will make users search in your site.

• It is your duty to monitor your AdSense dashboard to monitor the impressions

Wrap-Up

AFS is simple and easily understandable solution to the problem of monetizing on-site searches and boosting the navigability. Search got a site? Give AFS a shot: install it, monitor your clicks and feel free to post your numbers to the comments!

See more about AdSense For Search (AFS)