Matt Kundo

Posted on Apr 28 • Originally published at mattkundodigitalmarketing.com

Google AI Max Replaces Dynamic Search Ads: Migration Plan | MKDM

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Home / Blog / Google AI Max Replaces DSA Recent News & Paid Media & Google Ads Apr 27, 2026 7 min read Google AI Max Replaces Dynamic Search Ads: Migration Plan

Google is retiring Dynamic Search Ads in September 2026 and migrating advertisers to AI Max for Search campaigns. Here is the 6-step migration plan and why you should not let Google auto-migrate by default.

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Google AI Max Replaces Dynamic Search Ads: Your Migration Action Plan

Google is retiring Dynamic Search Ads. If you log into Google Ads in October 2026 to spin up a new DSA campaign, the option will be gone. Existing DSA campaigns will already be auto-migrated to Google AI Max for Search campaigns, the AI-powered replacement Google moved out of beta on April 15, 2026. This is the biggest change to Search campaigns in years, and most advertisers I talk to do not yet have a migration plan. Here is what is changing, why it matters, and the exact six-step checklist I am running for every Google Ads account I manage between now and September.

What Happened: Google Sunsets DSA

Google announced the retirement of Dynamic Search Ads in April 2026. The transition is in two phases. Right now (April through August 2026) is a voluntary upgrade window. You can manually port DSA campaigns to AI Max using new tools that transfer history, settings, and data into standard ad groups. Starting in September 2026, new DSA creation stops in the Google Ads UI, Editor, and API, and any remaining DSA campaigns, automatically created assets (ACA), and campaign-level broad match campaigns auto-migrate to AI Max with default features turned on. Google has been explicit about the timeline in its official announcement and the parallel Google for Business post. Search Engine Land confirmed the September cutoff.

Why Google AI Max for Search Campaigns Matters for Your Marketing

AI Max is not just a relabel of DSA. It is a different beast. DSA crawled your website and matched user queries to your page content. AI Max, powered by Gemini, expands beyond your site to broader real-time intent signals, generates ad copy on the fly, and routes traffic to landing pages it picks dynamically. The mechanics shift the role of the advertiser from "tell Google what to match on" to "give Google guardrails and audit what it does." That sounds great in a Google blog post. The independent data tells a more complicated story.

What DSA Users Lose (and Gain)

You lose the page-feed-driven targeting model where you controlled exactly which URLs Google could match queries against. You lose the separate dynamic ad group structure that made it easy to compare DSA against keyword campaigns side by side. What you gain is broader query coverage and AI-generated creative, which Google claims delivers an average 7% more conversions or conversion value at similar CPA/ROAS when the full feature suite (search term matching, text customization, final URL expansion) is enabled vs. search term matching alone. Note: that 7% figure is the official Google number for non-retail advertisers. Some early coverage cited 14%, which appears to be an outlier.

The Shift from Keyword Coverage to Intent Interpretation

This is the strategic pivot most articles gloss over. DSA was a keyword complement: you ran exact and phrase match keywords for the queries you knew about, and DSA caught the long-tail queries you missed. AI Max is something different. Google is asking you to trust its intent classifier to interpret what users actually want and route them through AI-generated headlines to AI-selected landing pages. That works beautifully when your site content is clean and your conversion data is dense. It works much less well when neither is true.

What Happens to Your Existing DSA Campaigns?

If you do nothing, Google will auto-migrate your DSA, ACA, and campaign-level broad match campaigns to AI Max by the end of September 2026. Default settings will be applied. Custom page feeds may be ignored. Negative keyword inheritance is described as "preserved where feasible," which is the kind of phrase that makes me want to migrate manually. The upside of the voluntary window is total control over what features are turned on, what URLs are eligible for expansion, and what your text guidelines say.

Action Plan: The 6-Step DSA to AI Max Migration Checklist

Here is the exact playbook I am using for client accounts. Run these in order before September. Do not skip steps four and five.

Audit current DSA campaigns (last 90 days). Export query data, impression share, CPA, ROAS, CPL, and conversion volume for every DSA campaign and ad group. This is your before-migration baseline. You will need it to evaluate AI Max performance honestly.
Clean your site for AI Max. Add noindex to pages you do not want AI Max to send traffic to (privacy policy, terms, thin category pages). Optimize H1s and meta titles on the pages you do want, because AI Max generates ad copy from page content. Audit page feeds for current catalog alignment.
Configure final URL expansion deliberately. Choose between full URL expansion and a curated URL list. Default migration may ignore your custom feeds. Voluntary migration lets you set the curated list explicitly and verify it before campaigns go live.
Pre-write your text guidelines and brand controls. AI Max will generate headlines and descriptions from your site and existing ads. Set the brand voice, location controls, and the text guidelines telling Google what NOT to say (for example, prohibited claims, competitor names, regulated language) before you migrate, not after.
Set performance baselines and run parallel for 2-4 weeks. Document your DSA CPA, conversion rate, and impression share. Use Google's experiment tooling to A/B test AI Max against DSA on 1-2 mid-volume campaigns for at least 14 days before flipping the switch on the full account. Pause DSA, do not delete, until AI Max performance has stabilized.
Monitor query matching weekly for 30 days post-migration. Pull the Search Terms Report every Monday. Tag irrelevant queries as negatives immediately. Independent analysis from Smarter Ecommerce on 250-plus campaigns found a median 13% revenue lift but a 16% CPA rise, with only 22% of campaigns hitting ROAS targets. The campaigns that performed well were the ones with active query monitoring and aggressive negative-keyword expansion in the first month.

How MKDM Can Help

I am already running this six-step playbook on Google Ads accounts I manage. If you are an in-house marketer or a business owner running your own Google Ads, the September deadline is a real one, and the cost of a bad auto-migration is higher than the cost of a planned voluntary one. My take is that anyone with significant DSA spend should be migrating in June or July, not in August (when learning periods will collide with back-to-school traffic) and definitely not by default in September. If you want a second set of eyes on your account, I offer Google Ads management and one-off audits. Schedule a Google Ads audit and I will walk through your DSA campaigns and your AI Max readiness in 30 minutes.

Frequently Asked Questions

When does Google stop allowing new Dynamic Search Ads?

September 2026. Starting that month, new DSA campaign creation is disabled in the Google Ads UI, Ads Editor, and API. Existing DSA campaigns will be auto-migrated to AI Max by the end of September if you have not already migrated them voluntarily.

What is Google AI Max for Search campaigns?

AI Max is Google's AI-powered evolution of Search campaigns, built on Gemini. It uses three primary features: search term matching (broader query coverage based on intent signals), text customization (AI-generated headlines and descriptions), and final URL expansion (dynamic landing page selection). It replaces Dynamic Search Ads and consolidates with standard Search ad groups instead of running in separate dynamic ad groups.

Will my existing Dynamic Search Ads stop working?

No. Existing DSA campaigns continue running until they are migrated. The change is that you cannot create new DSA campaigns starting in September 2026, and any DSA, automatically created assets (ACA), or campaign-level broad match campaigns that have not been voluntarily migrated will be auto-migrated to AI Max by the end of September with default settings applied.

Is AI Max better than Dynamic Search Ads?

It depends on your account, and the data is mixed. Google claims an average 7% lift in conversions or conversion value at similar CPA/ROAS when AI Max's full feature suite is enabled. Independent analysis from Digiday's coverage of marketer reactions and from Smarter Ecommerce shows real revenue gains for some accounts but a 16% CPA rise on average, with the majority of campaigns missing ROAS targets in the first weeks. AI Max appears to perform best on accounts with clean site content, dense conversion data, and active negative-keyword management. For accounts that depended on DSA to fill long-tail keyword gaps without much oversight, expect a learning period of 2-4 weeks and some CPA volatility.

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