Gemini quietly dropped its link tags. Check your Direct traffic.

Gemini stopped adding a small tracking label to the links it cites in answers around September 29, 2026, after about three weeks of using it. Visits from the Gemini iOS app send no referrer, so your analytics probably files some of them under Direct, where nothing flags them.

What changed

Server-log data published by search consultant Natzir Turrado, reported by PPC Land, shows Gemini adding utm_source=gemini to cited web addresses from early September. The tag made it possible to credit some visits to Gemini by name. Turrado's chart peaks at 83 tagged visits a day on September 28, then drops to 3 the next day.

Desktop visits still carry a referrer naming gemini.google.com, and that signal stayed flat the whole time. The gap is the phone apps. Turrado says the iOS app opens links in an embedded browser that sends no referrer. In his data, the tag also surfaced visits that arrived with no referrer at all, between 16 and 65 extra for every 100 that the referrer identified. He calls that range a floor.

Google hasn't said why the tag appeared, why it stopped, or whether it will come back. It published no documentation either time.

What it means for you

This matters most if you look at AI referrals in Google Analytics 4 (GA4), or if you've noticed Direct traffic moving without an obvious cause. Turrado puts Gemini's minimum share of Direct at 0.05% to 0.23% in a normal week, though he doesn't say how many sites that covers. For most local businesses that's a small slice. It's also the slice most likely to get misread.

You can ignore this if your leads come mostly from phone calls, a booking form, or Google Business Profile, and you don't track AI referrals at all.

The cost of doing nothing is quiet. You'll undercount visits from Gemini, and your Direct bucket will look like a mystery. Turrado's ChatGPT analysis shows how easily this hides. From October 7 to 16, ChatGPT lost 68% to 74% of its visits in server logs, yet the same drop showed up as much smaller in GA4, and Direct's normal swings were big enough to hide the rest.

What to do

Nothing in your ad accounts needs changing. These steps are about your measurement.

1. In GA4, go to Reports > Acquisition > Traffic acquisition. Check whether AI-related sources, including gemini.google.com, appear, and note the weekly numbers for the past eight weeks.
2. Go to Admin > Data display > Channel groups. If you want Gemini visits in their own bucket, create a custom channel. GA4's documentation has suggested an "AI Chatbots" channel that matches gemini among other assistant names.
3. Ask your web developer or host whether raw server logs are available. Searching for the "GeminiiOS" user agent is currently the only trace of iOS app visits that Turrado has found. Raw logs are not part of a standard GA4 report.
4. Add an "AI assistant" option to your "How did you hear about us?" question on forms, and train your staff to ask it on calls. No tool will catch the visits that have no label at all.
5. Don't move budget because of a Direct swing this month. Give yourself two or three weeks of data before reading anything into it.