Google Search Console’s New Multimodal Web Filter

Google has just opened a crack in an area we had largely been viewing in the dark: searches that begin with an image. The new Search Console Web: multimodal filter lets you measure which pages gain visibility when someone searches using a photo. For an ecommerce business, that is pretty meaty. It also has limits. LOTS of them.

The no-nonsense summary

• Web: multimodal: separates image-initiated searches through Lens, Circle to Search, Google Search, or Chrome.
• Four metrics: shows clicks, impressions, average CTR, and average position associated with pages.
• It does not analyse every photograph: data is attributed to the canonical URL, not a specific image, product, or variant.
• Worldwide rollout: includes Spain and the EU, although data will only appear if the property receives multimodal traffic.

Verdict: use it to spot pages with multimodal visibility, not to make up conclusions about sales or winning photos.

What is Search Console’s Web: multimodal filter?

Web: multimodal is a Search Console search type that groups web searches initiated with an image. It is not a new Google Images report or a magic magnifying glass that can inspect every photo in your catalogue.

According to Google’s official announcement of September 24, 2026, it includes searches made with Google Lens, Circle to Search on Android, images uploaded to Google, and Chrome’s option to search an image.

The distinction matters. The “Image” search type measures traffic from the Google Images tab. “Web: multimodal” isolates experiences where an image is the starting point for a web search. Mixing up the two would be like adding up window displays and in-store visits because both involve mannequins.

Google has added this data to both the Search results performance report and the generative AI features report. The Search Console documentation lets you filter, group, and export the information for analysis outside the platform.

What metrics does Web: multimodal show?

The filter lets you view clicks, impressions, average CTR, and average position. These are visibility and organic-traffic metrics associated with URLs, not direct sales indicators.

An impression means a result from your site appeared in a multimodal search. A click means the user ultimately visited the page from Google. CTR divides clicks by impressions and helps identify pages that appear often but attract little traffic.

Average position needs more care. Google defines it as a relative result position, so it does not mean a product page was always “third”. Averages, changing formats, and different search experiences make turning that number into an Olympic medal rather silly.

The official explanation of clicks, impressions, and position adds another key detail: Search Console attributes data to the canonical URL. If a product page contains six photos, the report does not separate which one triggered the appearance or click.

How to interpret product visibility without getting carried away

For retailers, this is where it gets interesting: compare pages, countries, devices, and dates. That way, you can identify which product pages or categories are starting to be discovered through image-initiated searches.

A product page with plenty of multimodal impressions and few clicks deserves a review. Google may be showing something different from what the user expected to find. Or the title may be unclear, the offer may be weak, or the page may be competing in a highly aggressive visual context. The report tells you where to look. Investigating the cause is up to you.

If a category gains clicks from mobile users in a particular country, that is a useful clue for prioritising analysis. Cross-reference it with conversions, revenue, availability, prices, and on-site behaviour in your analytics. Search Console does not know whether a sale happened or hand you advertising ROI wrapped in a bow.

The sensible approach is to work with page groups. Separate product pages, categories, and editorial content; compare equivalent periods; note changes to images, titles, or structured data; and wait for enough traffic before celebrating anything. An increase after changing the main product image is an interesting hypothesis. Giving it all the credit without a controlled test is analytics tarot.

What the multimodal filter does not tell you

Web: multimodal does not identify the exact photograph that triggered the result. Nor does it provide individual attribution by product or variant, or prove purchase intent, conversions, or revenue.

The specialist source Practical Ecommerce also observed that the filter shows the related URL, but not the specific image or a query list for these visual searches. The official documentation reviewed does not clarify whether the queries dimension is always empty, so that absence should be treated as an observed limitation, not a universal guarantee.

We also do not know how much traffic a property needs before it starts showing data, or whether a privacy threshold is involved. Google only confirms that metrics will appear once the site receives traffic from these experiences.

So what are you left with? A useful but incomplete tool. You can tell which pages are entering the multimodal space and how their exposure evolves. Reconstructing what the user saw or identifying which object Google detected is a different story.

Is Web: multimodal worth reviewing?

Yes. Especially if you sell products where shape, colour, or design matter during discovery. Fashion, décor, furniture, and spare parts look like natural candidates, but Google does not publish sector-specific data in these sources that would let us crown winners.

My recommendation is simple: review the filter, segment by page type, and look for sustained changes. If impressions appear without clicks, investigate. If clicks appear without sales, dig into your business analytics. If no data appears, do not hold a funeral for your organic rankings: the property may simply not have received multimodal traffic yet.

Search Console’s Web: multimodal filter does not tell you which photo sells. It tells you where your catalogue starts appearing when a user begins a search with an image. That difference may seem small. For anyone who knows how to measure without inventing the story, it is not.