Advertisers are receiving emails confirming that from 1 September, Search campaigns running Automatically Created Assets (ACA) and/or the campaign-level broad match setting will be automatically upgraded to AI Max for Search campaigns. No opt-in required. No migration to schedule.
Google says the rollout preserves existing campaign behaviour as closely as possible by applying AI Max settings that mirror current configurations. The mapping is straightforward:
Current campaign setting
1. Automatically Created Assets
2. Campaign-level broad match
What gets enabled on AI Max upgrade
1. AI Max with search term matching and text customisation enabled by default
2. AI Max with search term matching enabled
The update was first spotted by Menachem Ani of JXT Group, who shared the notification email on X.
Key Highlights
- 1 Sept: Auto-upgrade begins for eligible Search campaigns
- 2 Trigger Settings: Automatically Created Assets, or campaign-level broad match
- Default On: Search term matching for both; text customisation for ACA campaigns
The Mapping Isn’t As Neutral As It Looks
Campaign-level broad match to search term matching is a defensible swap. Both are query expansion mechanisms. You had already accepted that Google would go looking beyond your exact keyword list; the mechanism changes, the category of decision doesn’t.
Automatically Created Assets is a different matter. ACA is a creative setting. It generates headlines and descriptions from your landing pages. Turning it on is a statement about how much copywriting control you’re willing to delegate. It says nothing about how far you want your query matching to travel.
On 1 September, that creative setting buys you a targeting change: search term matching plus text customisation on top. Consent to one thing is being read as consent to the other.
ACA is a decision about who writes your headlines. It is being treated as a decision about which queries you buy.
Why This Catches eCommerce Accounts Hardest
ACA has been on by default in a large number of campaign builds for years. It is the kind of setting that survives agency transitions, gets inherited, and never appears in a QBR. Plenty of accounts about to be upgraded have no live record of anyone choosing it.
For retail specifically, the query expansion has knock-on effects that don’t show up as a Search line-item problem:
- Overlap with Shopping and PMax: Wider Search matching pulls in product-intent queries your Shopping and PMax campaigns were already covering. Same demand, counted twice, at a higher blended cost.
- Wrong-SKU traffic: Expansion into adjacent product queries sends people to landing pages that don’t hold what they searched for. That reads as a conversion rate problem, not a matching problem.
- Competitor and category drift: Terms you deliberately kept out of your keyword list can re-enter through matching, unless your negatives are structured to hold at account level.
- Copy governance: Text customisation rewrites headlines against landing page content. If your PDPs carry pricing, offer terms, delivery claims or regulated wording, the ad copy that gets generated is not going through your approval process.
What You Should Do Before 1 September
- Inventory every Search campaign with ACA or campaign-level broad match enabled. That list is your upgrade list.
- For each one, decide deliberately: is the search term matching something you want here, or something you inherited? Document the decision either way.
- Audit account-level negative keyword lists and brand exclusions. Campaign-level negatives won’t hold if matching widens.
- Baseline search term reports, CPA/ROAS and conversion rate by campaign now, so a September shift is measurable rather than arguable.
- Review landing pages feeding text customisation for pricing, offer and claim language that shouldn’t end up in an auto-generated headline.
- Check the notification email in your account for the opt-out or exclusion path: Google’s public communication doesn’t set out what’s available, so confirm rather than assume.
What Google Is Actually Signalling
This is the second automation default to land in as many weeks, after the 17 August Smart Bidding change. Both share a pattern: a control advertisers had been using in one way is redefined, and the new definition ships without an active decision from the account owner.
The direction has been obvious for years. Legacy campaign controls are being retired into AI-driven frameworks, and the migrations are increasingly automatic rather than opt-in. Arguing with the direction is a waste of a fortnight. Knowing exactly which of your campaigns are in scope, and what changes in each, is not
Useful
Nobody has to schedule a manual migration, and settings are mapped to preserve current behaviour rather than reset campaigns to defaults.
Caution
ACA campaigns get both search term matching and text customisation. That’s a targeting change and a creative change, triggered by an asset setting.
Honest
"Eligible" covers far more accounts than it sounds like. ACA has been quietly enabled in campaign builds for years, in many cases by nobody currently on the account.
The Bottom Line
Two settings decide whether your Search campaigns become AI Max campaigns on 1 September. Both are easy to check. Neither is likely to have been reviewed recently.
Pull the list this week. If the upgrade is right for a campaign, let it happen with your name on it. If it isn’t, you have three weeks to say so. After that, no basis for saying you weren’t told.
Need a fresh perspective? Let’s talk.
At 360 OM, we specialise in helping businesses take their marketing efforts to the next level. Our team stays on top of industry trends, uses data-informed decisions to maximise your ROI, and provides full transparency through comprehensive reports.
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