Table of contents
The Google Ads search terms report is a list of the actual searches that triggered your ads and led to a click. It is the closest thing Google gives you to a record of what people typed before they landed on your site, and for a plumber, electrician or roofer paying for every click, it is the first place to look when money seems to be going missing.
Most small business owners open it once, feel slightly overwhelmed by the rows, and close it again. This guide takes it slowly. It covers where to find the report, what each column tells you, how to sort the useful searches from the junk, what Google leaves out, and a recent change in how some searches are reported. It also explains where the report stops being helpful, because it can show you the words behind a click but not who made it.
Where do I find the search terms report in Google Ads?
You can find the Google Ads search terms report by clicking Campaigns in the left-hand menu, then choosing Search terms under Insights and reports. The report opens as a table, with one row for each search that produced a click or impression.
By default the table does not show which of your keywords triggered each search. According to Google’s help page on the search terms report, you can add that by opening the columns icon, choosing Attributes, ticking Keyword and applying the change. Do that first. It turns a plain list of searches into something you can act on, because you can see which keyword is responsible for each one.
If you want to look at one campaign or ad group at a time, Google points you to the Report editor under Insights and reports, where you can pick a predefined report. Set the date range to the last 30 days to begin with. A longer window gives you more rows but also makes it harder to tell what is happening now.
What does the search terms report show you?
The search terms report shows the searches people used that triggered your ad, along with the clicks, cost and conversions each one produced. It also shows the match type, which tells you how closely the search related to the keyword Google matched it with.
For Google Ads advertisers who are not full-time marketers, four columns do most of the work. The search term itself is the obvious one. The keyword column shows which of your keywords the search was matched to. The match type column shows whether the search was an exact match, a close variant, or something looser. And the cost and conversions columns show what each search has actually done for you.
A quick example helps. Say you are an electrician in Bristol and you bid on “electrician near me”. Your report might include “emergency electrician bristol”, which is exactly what you want, but also “electrician apprenticeship bristol” and “how to rewire a plug”. The keyword is the same in all three rows. Only the first one is a potential job. The report is how you find that out.
How do I read the search terms report step by step?
The simplest way to read the search terms report is to sort by cost, scan the top 20 rows, and put each one into a group: wanted, unwanted, or unsure. Doing this for ten minutes a week beats a long annual clean-up.
Start by sorting the cost column from highest to lowest. The searches that cost you the most matter most, so there is no need to read every row. Then work down the list asking one question of each: would I be happy to get a call from someone who typed this?
Wanted searches are the ones that describe the job you do in the place you do it. “Boiler service leeds” or “blocked drain emergency plumber” are the kind of thing you hope to see. If they have converted, consider adding them as keywords in their own right, so you can write an ad that speaks directly to them.
Unwanted searches are the ones that were never going to become work. Job seekers, students, DIYers, people looking for a different service, and searches from outside your area all fall here. These are the candidates for negative keywords, which tell Google not to show your ad for that wording again. Our guide to Google Ads negative keywords has starter lists for the main trades and explains the match types, so there is no need to repeat that here.
Unsure searches are the ones you cannot judge from the words alone. Leave those for a week, check whether they turn into conversions, and decide then. It is easy to over-block, and a search that looks odd sometimes turns out to be a customer using different words from yours.
What are the warning signs of wasted spend in the report?
The warning signs of wasted spend in the search terms report are searches that cost money but carry no buying intent, searches for places you do not serve, and searches that repeat with no conversions. Each one points to a different fix.
Here are the patterns to look for, in the order they tend to show up for trade businesses.
Jobs and training. Words like “jobs”, “careers”, “course”, “apprenticeship”, “salary” and “training” mean the person wants work or a qualification, not a service. These are among the easiest to remove.
Do-it-yourself searches. “How to”, “diy”, “tutorial” and “youtube” usually mean a person who wants to fix the problem themselves. Not every “how to” is wasted, as someone who finds a job too difficult may ring you, but they convert far less often than “emergency” or “near me” searches.
The wrong place. If you cover Manchester and the report shows clicks for Birmingham, your location settings need a look. Our post on Google Ads location targeting explains why ads appear outside your service area and how to fix it.
The wrong service. Broad keywords can pull in neighbouring trades. A gas engineer who bids on “heating” may find clicks from people who want an electric underfloor fitter. A tighter keyword or a negative usually solves it.
Large spend, no outcome. A search that has cost a meaningful amount and produced no calls or forms is worth a closer look, but give it enough clicks before judging. Two clicks and no enquiry tells you very little. Twenty clicks and nothing is a pattern.
Once you have picked out these leaks, the bigger picture of where your budget goes is covered in our guide to Google Ads wasted spend, which goes through six common leaks in turn.
What does the search terms report not show?
The search terms report does not show every search. Google leaves out low-volume searches to protect privacy, and it does not show the searcher’s identity, device details beyond basic segments, or whether the click was genuine.
Google’s help page says searches without enough query activity are omitted from the report for data privacy reasons, and that these are grouped into subthemes or an “other queries” bucket in the related search terms insights view. In practice, this means you can spend a good sum on a campaign and still not see every term behind it. If the rows you can see add up to far less than your total spend, the gap is often hidden searches, which is normal.
Google also says the report cannot be used to add keywords or negative keywords directly from the Report editor view, so use the main Search terms page for that. And it notes that terms matched through Dynamic Search Ads or Shopping targets do not return a keyword and simply show “Exact” as the match type, which can look confusing the first time you meet it.
Finally, conversion numbers in the report can differ slightly from other views because of conversion lag. Calls and forms that happen days after the click are credited back later. If a search looks like it has produced nothing, check again a week on before you block it.
Has Google changed what the search terms report shows?
Yes, in part. In May 2026, Search Engine Journal reported that Google added a clarification to its help documentation saying that, for some AI-driven search experiences, a search term may reflect the inferred meaning or intent behind a search rather than the literal words typed.
The experiences named were AI Mode, AI Overviews, Google Lens and autocomplete. The article says Google has not explained how much interpretation takes place, or whether advertisers can tell an interpreted term from a literal one. So if you see a search term that reads oddly or looks too neat, it might be Google’s summary of what someone meant.
For a small advertiser, the practical effect is modest but real. Do not assume every row is a copy of someone’s keystrokes. Judge a term by its results, such as clicks, cost and calls, rather than by how strange it looks, and be a little slower to block something that has converted.
There are also signs Google is testing a combined view. In October 2026, Search Engine Roundtable reported that one advertiser had spotted a “search terms and ad combinations” report, showing searches alongside the headlines, descriptions and landing pages that were used. It was described as a test seen in one account, so you may not have it yet. If you run AI Max, our explainer on Google AI Max covers why this kind of reporting matters.
How often should I check the search terms report?
For most trade businesses, checking the search terms report once a week for ten minutes is enough, and checking daily is only worth it in the first fortnight of a new campaign or after a big settings change. More frequent checks tend to lead to knee-jerk blocking.
A routine that works for a busy owner looks like this. On the same day each week, open the report and set the range to the last seven days. Sort by cost. Add clear negatives from the top 20 rows. Note any searches that have converted and might deserve their own keyword. Then close it. Once a month, widen the range to 30 days and look for slower patterns that a single week hides.
New campaigns need more attention at the start. The first two weeks are when broad matching throws up the strangest searches, so a few extra looks early can save a lot of money. If you have never reviewed your account properly, our Google Ads audit checklist puts the search terms review into a sensible order alongside everything else.
What does the search terms report not tell you about click fraud?
The search terms report cannot tell you whether a click was genuine. It records the words used in a search, not who typed them, where they were, or whether a person or a bot clicked the ad. A search can look perfectly sensible and still have produced an invalid click.
This is the blind spot that catches people out. You can have a spotless search terms report, with tidy negatives and sensible keywords, and still lose money to traffic that was never going to buy. In ClickGuardian’s own data, covering 2,334,216 paid clicks across 184 advertisers between 22 July and 20 October 2026, 9.1% of paid clicks showed at least one warning sign of invalid traffic. That figure comes from advertisers who chose to use ClickGuardian, partly because they were worried about fraud, so treat it as a benchmark for protected accounts rather than an average for every advertiser. The click fraud statistics page sets out the method and the caveats.
The same page notes that 16.4% of paid clicks came from an IP address that had clicked the same advertiser more than once that day. Some of that is innocent, such as a homeowner coming back to compare quotes. But it shows the kind of pattern the search terms report cannot reveal, because it has no column for IP address, browser or time on site.
There are a few places where the report can offer a clue, though never proof. A cluster of near-identical searches with clicks and no conversions, a competitor’s brand name appearing again and again, or odd searches that spike on a single day are all worth noting. Our guide on how to detect click fraud shows where to look for the evidence that does confirm it, and the post on why Google’s invalid click protection is not enough explains what Google’s own filters leave behind.
If you run Performance Max, the picture is murkier still, because you see far less of what is happening. We cover that in Performance Max and click fraud. And if you work in a trade where emergency keywords are expensive, the plumbers click fraud guide shows how the problem tends to appear in practice.
Once you have cleaned up the searches, a sensible next step is to see what traffic quality might be costing you. Tools such as ClickGuardian watch for the patterns the search terms report cannot see and block the sources automatically, and the ClickGuardian ROI calculator takes about a minute to put a rough figure on it. Any unfamiliar terms along the way are explained in the glossary.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where is the search terms report in Google Ads?
The Google Ads search terms report is under Campaigns, then Insights and reports, then Search terms. The keyword column is hidden by default, so open the columns icon, choose Attributes, tick Keyword and apply it to see which keyword triggered each search.
What is the difference between keywords and search terms in Google Ads?
A keyword is the word or phrase you choose to bid on, and a search term is the exact search a person used that triggered your ad. One keyword can match many different search terms. The search terms report shows you the second list, which is how you find searches you never meant to pay for.
How often should I check the Google Ads search terms report?
Weekly is enough for most small advertisers, and it only takes about ten minutes. Check more often in the first two weeks of a new campaign, when broad matching tends to throw up the strangest searches. A monthly check over a 30-day range helps you spot slower patterns.
Why can’t I see all my search terms in Google Ads?
Google omits searches with too little query activity to protect privacy, so the report never shows every term behind your spend. Some searches are grouped into an “other queries” bucket in search terms insights. It is normal for visible rows to add up to less than your total cost.
Can the search terms report show me click fraud?
Not directly. The report shows the words used in a search, not who clicked or whether they were a real person. It can give clues, such as repeated odd searches with no conversions, but confirming invalid clicks needs data on IP addresses, devices and behaviour. A tool such as ClickGuardian is built to look at those.
Last updated: November 2026. Related ClickGuardian resources: the click fraud statistics page, our industry guides for home services, the glossary of PPC terms, and the ClickGuardian ROI calculator to estimate what invalid clicks are costing your own campaigns.
Written by Dan Slay
Founder
Dan Slay is the founder of ClickGuardian. After experiencing click fraud first-hand running Google Ads campaigns, he built ClickGuardian to give businesses the tools to detect and block fraudulent clicks in real-time. Dan oversees product strategy and growth, and is passionate about helping advertisers get more from their ad spend.