Organic search click-through rates (CTR) depend on far more than a page’s position. The figures below show how ranking, device, industry, branding, search intent, and Google result-page features change the share of impressions that become organic clicks. The studies cover different periods and methodologies, so each benchmark should be read in its stated context.
Contents
- Organic CTR by Google ranking position and device
- Industry-specific organic CTR benchmarks
- How Google SERP features reshape organic CTR
- AI Overviews, zero-click behavior, and organic CTR
- Branded versus unbranded organic CTR
- Query intent, device shifts, and cross-study context
Organic CTR by Google ranking position and device
seoClarity’s 2021 CTR Study measured separate mobile and desktop click-through rates for each of Google’s top 10 organic positions. Position 1 reached 4.74% on mobile and 6.65% on desktop. Position 2 measured 2.89% on mobile and 2.37% on desktop, while position 3 measured 2.47% and 2.69%, respectively.
The remaining positions were much lower. Position 4 produced 1.85% on mobile and 1.73% on desktop; position 5 produced 1.23% and 1.13%. Position 6 measured 0.85% on mobile and 0.96% on desktop, and position 7 measured 0.80% and 0.77%. Position 8 had a 0.66% mobile CTR and 0.68% desktop CTR. Position 9 measured 0.53% and 0.61%, while position 10 measured 0.50% and 0.55%.
Across positions 1 through 10, the study reported a combined 18.14% desktop CTR and 16.52% mobile CTR. These figures are aggregate 2021 benchmarks, not universal targets for every query or current Google result page.
| Organic position | Mobile CTR | Desktop CTR |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4.74% | 6.65% |
| 2 | 2.89% | 2.37% |
| 3 | 2.47% | 2.69% |
| 4 | 1.85% | 1.73% |
| 5 | 1.23% | 1.13% |
| 6 | 0.85% | 0.96% |
| 7 | 0.80% | 0.77% |
| 8 | 0.66% | 0.68% |
| 9 | 0.53% | 0.61% |
| 10 | 0.50% | 0.55% |
Industry-specific organic CTR benchmarks
The same seoClarity 2021 study found meaningful variation between sectors. Business and industrial queries had a top-10 CTR of 21.32% on desktop and 19.03% on mobile. Finance queries were higher on mobile, at 23.97%, compared with 20.77% on desktop. Health queries showed the reverse pattern: 23.18% on desktop versus 20.26% on mobile.
Home and garden queries reached 19.84% on desktop and 17.38% on mobile across the top 10. In consumer electronics, the top 10 desktop listings generated a 17.4% higher click total than the top 10 mobile listings, even though desktop had fewer impressions.
Sector differences also appeared at position 1. Jobs and education queries had a 9.53% mobile position-1 CTR and an 8.45% desktop position-1 CTR. Real-estate queries measured 10.61% on mobile and 9.28% on desktop. Retail and ecommerce queries measured 8.68% on mobile and 7.75% on desktop.
These figures show why a single “average organic CTR” can be misleading. A sector benchmark describes the mix of queries and result pages in that study; it does not isolate ranking position, search intent, or SERP layout in the same way for every industry.
The device direction is not consistent across categories. Finance, jobs and education, real estate, and retail and ecommerce all recorded higher position-1 or top-10 mobile figures than desktop in the reported comparisons. Health, home and garden, and the overall top-10 seoClarity benchmark recorded higher desktop figures. That mixed pattern is a reminder to compare like with like: changing the device segment can change the benchmark even when the keyword set and ranking range appear similar.
How Google SERP features reshape organic CTR
SISTRIX’s CTRs for Various Types of Google Search Result study was published in 2019, and the page was modified July 7, 2025. Its mobile comparisons show how the surrounding result features can change the CTR attached to position 1.
On purely organic SERPs, mobile position 1 had a 34.2% CTR. When sitelinks were present, position 1 reached 46.9%. Featured-snippet SERPs had a 23.3% position-1 CTR. Google Apps SERPs measured 16.3%, and knowledge-panel SERPs measured 16.8%.
Shopping-feature SERPs had a 13.7% mobile position-1 CTR, while Google Ads SERPs had 18.9%. Video-feature SERPs produced 32.5%, and image-result SERPs produced 18.5%. SISTRIX also reported a 14.0% mobile CTR for position 2 when sitelinks were present, compared with 17.1% for position 2 on purely organic SERPs.
The comparison makes “position 1” an incomplete description of visibility. A first organic listing can receive very different click shares depending on what occupies the space above, beside, or around it.
AI Overviews, zero-click behavior, and organic CTR
Advanced Web Ranking’s Google Organic CTR by Position: 2026 Study + AI Overviews measured Google US desktop results in July 2026. Across all SERP types, position 1 had a 20.02% organic CTR. When a Google AI Overview appeared, position-1 CTR was 9.69%, which the study described as 52% below its all-SERP baseline.
AI Overviews appeared on 43% of the sampled Google US desktop SERPs. The zero-click rate was 74.3% on SERPs with an AI Overview and 53.6% on SERPs without one. AWR reported a 64% reduction in position-2 CTR and a 56% reduction in position-3 CTR when an AI Overview appeared, relative to its baseline.
The study also reported substantial movement during 2026. Google US desktop position-1 CTR fell from 45.6% in February 2026 to 14.6% in May, a 68% decline. In July 2026, the heaviest feature combination left the position-1 organic result with a 0.15% CTR, described as a 99% loss versus baseline.
These are time-specific AWR estimates, so they should not be merged with the 2021 seoClarity or 2019 SISTRIX figures as though all three measured the same population.
Branded versus unbranded organic CTR
Brand familiarity produced a large gap in AWR’s July 2026 Google US desktop comparison. At position 1, branded queries averaged a 27.32% CTR, compared with 19.38% for unbranded queries. At position 2, the branded rate was 16.93% versus 9.64% unbranded. At position 3, branded terms reached 12.75% and unbranded terms 6.02%.
The gap continued lower on the page. Position 4 averaged 10.23% for branded queries and 3.88% for unbranded queries. Position 5 averaged 7.91% and 2.68%. At position 10, branded terms still produced a 4.04% CTR, while unbranded terms produced 0.81%.
An earlier Perficient clickstream study, published September 30, 2019, reported a 71.36% aggregate top-10 CTR for branded queries and 37.88% for non-branded queries. The older result is a historical clickstream benchmark and should not be treated as an independently verified current rate.
Query intent, device shifts, and cross-study context
Query intent changed the AWR July 2026 Google US desktop position-1 comparison. Informational queries had a 17.69% organic CTR without an AI Overview and 10.88% with one. Commercial queries measured 11.91% without an AI Overview and 3.51% with one. Transactional queries measured 10.38% without one and 7.80% with one.
The contrast suggests that SERP context matters alongside the ranking itself. Informational searches had the highest no-Overview rate among these three intent groups, while commercial searches had the lowest with an AI Overview. The supplied figures are category-specific measurements, not a general causal estimate of how intent changes CTR.
Perficient’s September 2019 clickstream study found 13.4 times as many clicks going to organic results as paid results on desktop and 9.1 times as many organic as paid clicks on mobile. In the same dataset, no-click searches represented about 14% of queries containing ads and 37% of queries without ads.
Taken together, the benchmarks support a segmented reporting approach. Track CTR by ranking position, device, industry, branded status, intent, and SERP features; record the measurement period; and keep AI Overview results separate from older organic-only or mixed-SERP studies. A single sitewide average can hide each of these differences.