Google's News AI Pilot Expands to Over 400 Publications, Adding U.S. Local News Outlets

Google Expands Licensed News AI Pilot

Google announced on Thursday that its News AI pilot program has grown to more than 400 publications worldwide. The program, launched in December, licenses content from select publishers and uses it to test new AI features in Google News. At launch, it partnered with international outlets including The Guardian, El País, The Times of India, and The Washington Post.

The latest expansion adds CNN, The Financial Times, Axios, and Forbes. It also adds local news publishers across the U.S., including The Post and Courier in Charleston, South Carolina; Oil City News in Casper, Wyoming; Shaw Media, a newspaper chain based in Illinois and Iowa; and the nonprofit newsroom The Texas Tribune.

How the Pilot Pays Publishers

"People's information consumption habits are changing, and we want to make sure publishers of all sizes, local newsrooms included, can navigate these shifts," Brianna Puccini Duff, a spokesperson for Google, said in a statement to Nieman Lab. Duff said Google declined to comment on the exact terms of the deals, but she clarified that the pilot does not operate on a "pay-per-value" model, meaning publishers are not compensated based on how much their content contributes to an AI-generated output.

Publishers are instead paid to provide content that appears in experimental AI-powered features. The pay-per-value model is part of a parallel program that pays publishers for content surfaced in AI Overviews, AI Mode, and Gemini, according to a recent report by Digiday.

Experimental AI Features in Google News

One test feature is "story previews," in-depth, AI-generated summaries of recent stories that may show up on a publisher's Google News page. Google's example from The Washington Post carries a disclaimer noting the copy is AI-generated and "may include mistakes."

Another feature is "audio briefing," a customizable, AI-generated podcast in the Google News app that stitches together daily headlines. Users can select the topics they are most interested in hearing about, including "World," "Gaming," or "Sports" news, and the briefings include citations that link to the articles mentioned.

Sources: Nieman Lab · Techmeme · Google Blog