Figures for Chartbeat’s publisher network put the year-over-year decline in Google Search referrals at 40.2% from July 2025 to July 2026. The preceding annual comparison recorded a reported decline of 21.9%.
Google Discover referrals also fell
The reported year-over-year decline in Google Discover referrals was 6.6% in the preceding comparison and 34.3% from July 2025 to July 2026.
Referral declines and traffic shares measure different things
A separate measure tracks Google Search’s share of pageviews in Chartbeat’s publisher network: about 9% in July 2024 and about 5% in July 2026.
Across those same two-year endpoints, the reported share for direct traffic rose from 13.5% to 15.9%, while dark social increased from 7.1% to 11.3% and internal traffic from 37.9% to 40.4%. Dark social refers to links shared through texts, direct messages, and private channels.
