According to the JabJab Online Marketing Q3 2026 AI Traffic Index, traffic to Hungarian websites coming from AI-powered interfaces has increased roughly one hundredfold in less than two years. Two years ago, only 0.01 percent of total visits to the analyzed Hungarian sites originated from AI surfaces such as ChatGPT or Gemini; by summer 2026 that share exceeded 1 percent.
News sites saw a six- to sevenfold rise in four months
The most pronounced change affected news websites: over the past four months they received six to seven times more visitors referred from AI platforms than in the previous period. Factors contributing to this jump likely include heightened information demand around the spring parliamentary elections and a change in AI responses since May that surfaced more and more prominent citations.
Tamás Geiger, Chief Operating Officer of JabJab Online Marketing, commented: “The growth rate of AI traffic is at first sight astonishing. In autumn 2024 it was almost unmeasurable; by summer 2026 it already accounted for more than 1 percent of total site traffic. Users turn to AI for more everyday questions and often reach news, products or services from there.”
AI referrals do not yet replace lost Google traffic
Despite the dramatic increase, AI-driven visits have so far only offset a small fraction of the traffic lost from traditional search engines, primarily Google. Comparing April–July 2026 with the same months of the previous year, the additional traffic from AI compensated for only 4.7 percent of the visits that disappeared from search engines.
“Previously it seemed that AI returned some portion of the traffic it had taken from websites. Now we have reached an important turning point. The number of visitors coming from AI is indeed growing very fast, but it is far from compensating for the loss from Google. Based on this year’s data, AI brings back fewer than five of every one hundred lost visitors,” Geiger added.
Part of the explanation is that AI systems increasingly provide answers or summaries that satisfy users without requiring a click through to the original page. JabJab’s analysts nevertheless stress the ongoing need to verify sources, because AI summaries can sometimes be inaccurate.
Sector differences: marketplaces, electronics, telco
There are sizable differences across sectors. Marketplaces saw AI-referred traffic approach 1.6 percent, electronics e-shops about 1.4 percent, and telecommunications sites around 1.1 percent. Accommodation booking platforms so far appear relatively better positioned: their search-engine traffic has not fallen as sharply as in several other categories.
News sites, while receiving substantial absolute AI traffic, face a complex situation: their search-derived visits have nearly halved according to the analysis, and AI-driven increments have only partially compensated that decline.
Implications for publishers and online businesses
JabJab Online Marketing concludes that AI has quickly become an independent information and traffic channel in Hungary. A key question going forward is how sites that produce news, guides and comparisons can remain relevant when users increasingly obtain full answers directly on AI surfaces. The spread of so-called agentic commerce—where purchases may be completed directly through AI interfaces—could further accelerate this shift.
The JabJab AI Traffic Index examined trends in several categories, including news sites, marketplaces, e-commerce stores, banks, telecommunications providers, pharmacies, recipe sites and accommodation platforms for Q3 2026.
