Google preferred sources: the visibility lever your readers pull

What it actually does

A signed-in Google user searching a news topic sees an icon next to Top Stories. They open it, search for a site, and select it. From then on Google gives that site preferential treatment in that user's Top Stories, marks it with a preferred badge, adds a separate "From your sources" block on the results page, and flags it as one of their chosen sources in AI Mode and AI Overviews.

Two limits are worth stating plainly, because most coverage skips them. The effect exists only for the person who made the selection. And only domains and subdomains can be selected, so https://www.example.com/ and https://code.example.com/ are eligible while https://www.example.com/blog is not.

How it grew from a news feature into an AI one

Preferred sources started narrow and kept widening, which is why advice written a year ago describes a different feature.

• August 2025. Google launched it in the US and India after a Labs beta. In early testing, more than half of the people who used it picked four or more sources.
• December 2025. Google said it was going worldwide for English-language users, with all supported languages to follow. At that point readers had selected nearly 90,000 unique sources, from local blogs to global outlets.
• May 2026. The mechanic reached AI Mode and AI Overviews. This is the change that turned a news-carousel setting into something that touches AI answers.
• August 2026. Google published developer documentation and an embeddable button, the first time a publisher could start the opt-in from its own pages. Google said readers had by then selected more than 345,000 unique sources.

Today the documentation puts Top Stories in every language Google Search supports, and AI Mode and AI Overviews everywhere those features run.

Why a small feature is worth the ten minutes

The wider context is that AI answers absorb clicks that used to reach publishers. Preferred sources is Google's response: a way for a reader to say which sites they still want to hear from, and for Google to honor it in the surfaces that were doing the absorbing. Whether it offsets much is unproven. Google has published adoption counts, not traffic recovery.

The reason to do it anyway is cost. Adding the link is one anchor tag. There is no ongoing work and nothing to maintain.

What it will not do

Being clear about this is more useful than another list of tips.

• It is not a ranking factor. Your position for people who have not selected you is unchanged. There is no aggregate boost from having many selectors.
• It only reaches people who already know you. Nobody selects a site they have not read. Preferred sources deepens an audience you have; it does not build one.
• Eligibility is not automatic. Only sites that already appear in Google's source preferences tool can be selected, and the feature is rooted in Top Stories, a news surface. If you publish three posts a year, check before you promote it.
• It is Google only. Claude, ChatGPT and Grok have no equivalent setting. Nothing here changes what those models say about you.

Adding it to your site: three methods and the tradeoff

Google documents three ways and states that none of them are required to be eligible. They exist so readers can act without hunting through Search settings.

1. Google's drop-in button

Google's own recommendation. Load the script and place the div:

<script async src="https://news.google.com/swg/js/v1/publisher.js"></script>
<div google-add-preferred-source-btn></div>

The div takes data-theme="dark" and a data-lang override.

2. The same script, your own button

Import the module and call it from any element you have designed yourself:

import { preferredSource } from
  "https://news.google.com/swg/js/v1/publisher.mjs";

preferredSource.init({ theme: 'light', lang: 'en' });
document.querySelector('#myButton').onclick = () => {
  preferredSource.addPreferredSource();
};

3. A plain link, with or without Google's badge

Point an anchor at the preferences tool with your domain in the query:

<a href="https://www.google.com/preferences/source?q=example.com">
  Add as a preferred source
</a>

Plain text works, but you do not have to settle for it. Google publishes the same badge its script renders, as a translated image set covering 18 languages in light and dark, and the documentation shows it used inside an ordinary anchor. Download it, host the file yourself, and you get the button readers recognize without loading anything from Google:

<a href="https://www.google.com/preferences/source?q=example.com">
  <img src="/img/google-preferred-source-badge.png"
       srcset="/img/google-preferred-source-badge.png 1x,
               /img/google-preferred-source-badge-2x.png 2x"
       width="338" height="107"
       alt="Add as a preferred source on Google">
</a>

The asset ships at 338x107 with a 2x retina file, so set width and height to keep the layout from shifting while it loads. Name the retina file -2x rather than the conventional @2x if you host on Cloudflare, which normalizes the @ to %40 with a redirect and makes every retina load pay a round trip. That is the version at the bottom of this page.

How this fits the rest of your AI visibility

Preferred sources changes what a particular reader sees once they have chosen you. It does not change the answer a stranger gets when they ask an assistant which company to use, and that answer is where most of the risk sits. A model can rank you below competitors, describe you with a stale claim, or invent a brand that does not exist and put it above you.

Those are separate problems with separate fixes, and neither shows up in your analytics. The only way to know is to ask the models on a schedule and read what comes back. That is what AI visibility monitoring means in practice, and it is what Saidly does across Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, and Grok.

Common questions

Find out what the models say about you

Preferred sources is one setting on one search engine. Start a free trial, name what you track, and read what Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, and Grok actually say, with the sources each one cited.

30-day free trial. No credit card to start. Saidly is built by WoodFire Digital LLC.

Sources

Dates, figures and code on this page come from the following.

• Preferred sources (Google Search Central developer documentation). The source for eligibility, the domain and subdomain rule, the three implementation methods and the code above, the availability statement, and the point that none of the methods are required. The badge on this page is Google's own translated asset, from the button asset download that page links.
• How to select your preferred sources in Top Stories in Search (Google, August 12, 2025). The launch in the US and India, the "From your sources" block, and the finding that over half of early users picked four or more sources.
• Google rolling out Preferred Sources globally (Search Engine Land, December 10, 2025), quoting Google VP Robby Stein. The source for the global rollout, the nearly 90,000 unique sources, and the twice-as-often click figure.
• Google gives publishers a new way to fight AI-driven traffic losses (TechCrunch, August 20, 2026). The source for the embeddable button announcement, the expansion into AI Mode and AI Overviews beginning May 2026, and the 345,000 unique sources figure.