Seotal's State of AI SEO in Southeast Asia Report: Google AI Mode Reaches Five Local Languages

ChatGPT drew more web visits than Facebook in Indonesia and Singapore, 71% of shoppers in SEA markets discover products on marketplaces, according to Seotal.

SINGAPORE, SINGAPORE, September 14, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Google's AI search now answers in Filipino, Indonesian, Malay, Thai and Vietnamese. Its AI Mode help page read on September 13, 2026, lists all five languages and names Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines among supported locations.

Seotal, which matches businesses with vetted freelance SEO specialists, reviewed Google's documentation alongside Similarweb traffic rankings, Statcounter referral data and two consumer surveys to describe the state of AI search optimization, often called AI SEO or generative engine optimization, across those six markets.

The review points to three shifts for businesses that depend on search in the region: AI answers are available in local languages, AI assistants have become major web destinations, and product discovery often starts outside search engines.

State of AI SEO in Southeast Asia, key findings:

- Local-language AI search is live, but the newest features are English only. Google named Indonesian among six languages when AI Overviews expanded to more than 100 countries in October 2024, and AI Mode added Indonesian on September 8, 2025. Google's help page lists Gemini 3 Pro as the model in AI Mode and interactive charts in AI Mode as English only.

- Searches are getting longer. The e-Conomy SEA 2025 report by Google, Temasek and Bain and Company cites Google data showing queries 2 to 3 times the length of traditional searches in May 2025, and visual search growing 70% a year as of July 2025.

- AI assistants rank among the most visited websites. On Similarweb's country rankings for August 2026, chatgpt.com was the 4th most visited website in Indonesia and Singapore, ahead of facebook.com in both. gemini.google.com ranked between 9th and 13th in all six countries, after sitting outside the top 20 in every one of them in June to August 2025. perplexity.ai was outside the top 50 in all six.

- Clicks from AI assistants concentrate on ChatGPT, with local exceptions. ChatGPT sent 86.13% of AI chatbot referrals to websites in Indonesia in August 2026, according to Statcounter. Microsoft Copilot took 8.27% of referrals in the Philippines in June 2025, and Claude took 5.58% in Singapore in June 2026, its highest monthly share in any of the six countries.

- Product discovery starts on marketplaces. In a report published in July 2026 by impact.com, Cube Asia and dentsu, based on 2,400 consumers across the six markets, 71% said they discover new products on online marketplaces, 57% through search engines and 24% use generative AI in their shopping journey, as ITBrief Asia reported.

- AI features already shape purchases. In a Google and Milieu survey of 7,200 consumers across ASEAN in September 2025, cited in the e-Conomy SEA 2025 report, 75% said AI chatbots, translators and image search helped them discover content, and 62% said AI features such as personalised recommendations influenced a purchase.

Search work in Southeast Asia now has to cover the answer as well as the ranking, in Thai, Vietnamese and Bahasa Indonesia as well as English," said Ali, co-founder of Seotal. "Local-language pages, marketplace listings and clear structured data belong in the same plan as Google rankings, because the data shows discovery spreading across all three."

Methodology
Seotal did not run its own survey for this review. Language and feature availability comes from Google's AI Mode and AI Overviews help pages and Google's product announcements. Website rankings come from Similarweb's public country lists, which rank sites by web visits, not app use. Referral shares come from Statcounter, which counts clicks from AI chatbots to websites rather than people. Consumer figures come from the impact.com, Cube Asia and dentsu report as reported by ITBrief Asia, and from the Google and Milieu survey published in e-Conomy SEA 2025.

About Seotal
Seotal matches small and medium businesses with vetted freelance SEO and marketing specialists on dedicated part-time contracts. Founded in November 2020, it works with talent in India, the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia and Cambodia. More information is available at seotal.com.

Trivita Utami
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