DSA to AI Max, the September 2026 Migration Checklist
Google's auto-upgrade wave starts in September 2026: campaigns using Automatically Created Assets and the campaign-level broad match setting convert to AI Max first, while Dynamic Search Ads got a reprieve to February 2027 in Google's June 11 update. This checklist covers six steps to migrate on your own terms: inventory, baselines, URL exclusions, brand controls, reporting deltas, and a post-upgrade watch window. PaidSync runs the inventory and audit steps across your Google Ads accounts in one conversation, and its Free plan covers a small inventory pass at $0.
Every date on this page was checked against the live source on August 1, 2026. That matters here more than usual, because the deadline moved in June and much of the coverage published in April and May still says September for everything.
The deadline moved and most coverage missed it
Google announced the DSA upgrade on April 15, 2026 with auto-upgrades starting in September. On June 11, 2026 Google quietly updated the same blog post: the Dynamic Search Ads sunset and auto-upgrade now begin in February 2027, while campaigns using Automatically Created Assets and campaign-level broad match still auto-upgrade starting September 2026. PPC Land documented the change on June 23, along with a January 2027 end date for creating new DSA campaigns per Google's rewritten support docs. If your migration plan says "everything by September," it is working from stale dates.
What Changes and When
Three legacy setups trigger the auto-upgrade, per Google's announcement: Dynamic Search Ads campaigns, Automatically Created Assets, and the campaign-level broad match setting. AI Max itself left beta with that April 15 announcement, after adoption by hundreds of thousands of advertisers per Search Engine Land's coverage. The timeline as verified on August 1, 2026:
| Date | What happens | Who it hits |
|---|---|---|
| April 15, 2026 | AI Max out of beta, voluntary upgrade tools roll out | Everyone, opt-in |
| June 1, 2026 | Branded search controls reach AI Max campaigns | AI Max adopters |
| September 2026 | Auto-upgrade begins | Campaigns with ACA or campaign-level broad match |
| January 2027 | New DSA campaign creation ends (per Google's support docs) | Anyone building new DSA |
| February 2027 | DSA sunset and auto-upgrade begins | All remaining DSA campaigns |
The extension is breathing room, not a pardon. Google has already moved this timeline once, and its announcement pushes voluntary upgrades as the way to keep "full control over your campaign setup," while auto-upgraded campaigns arrive with settings Google configures to mirror the legacy setup. Treat September as your working deadline and February as the hard stop.
The Six Step Migration Checklist
1Inventory every campaign the upgrade will touch
You need three lists, not one. First, every Dynamic Search Ads campaign. Second, every campaign with Automatically Created Assets enabled, at account or campaign level. Third, every campaign using the campaign-level broad match setting. The second and third lists auto-upgrade in September 2026. The first list has until February 2027.
For each campaign, record type, the triggering setting, and its share of account spend over the last 90 days. A DSA campaign at 2% of spend is a cleanup task. A DSA campaign at 40% of spend is a project with a deadline. Agencies should run this per client and sort by spend share; the September wave decides which clients need a conversation this month.
2Baseline 90 days of performance before anything converts
Once a campaign upgrades, the argument about whether AI Max helped or hurt is only winnable with a pre-migration record. Snapshot 90 days of CPA, ROAS, conversion volume, impression share, and top search terms by cost for every campaign on your inventory list. Ecommerce accounts should add average order value, so a post-upgrade revenue lift can be split into more orders versus bigger ones on your own data.
Export the DSA search terms report now, while the pre-upgrade views are intact. The reporting structure changes after migration (step 5), and a baseline captured in the old format is the cleanest before-and-after evidence you will get.
3Rebuild URL rules and exclusions on the AI Max side
DSA runs on page feeds and URL rules. AI Max steers with landing page controls and its own URL expansion settings. Do not assume your exclusions carry over. Rebuild each DSA URL exclusion in the AI Max controls, then open the upgraded campaign and verify every excluded path by hand. Out-of-stock pages, careers pages, and support docs are the classic leaks.
Negative keywords still work in AI Max. Carry your DSA negative lists over deliberately rather than trusting the upgrade to do it. If your negative list discipline is thin, fix that before September; our guide to automating negative keywords with AI covers the workflow.
4Set brand controls before the upgrade, not after
The documented failure mode of AI Max expansion is branded leakage. PPC Land reported on June 1, 2026 that AI Max's intent-based expansion was entering branded query auctions in ways that disrupt parallel branded campaigns, inflate CPCs, and distort attribution data. Google's fix is native branded search controls with three options: show on all relevant searches, control branded traffic with brand inclusions and exclusions, or show only on unbranded searches.
Set these before your campaigns convert. A prospecting campaign that quietly buys your own brand terms for two weeks will make AI Max look better than it is, and your branded campaign worse.
5Learn the reporting deltas before September
Google rewrote the AI Max reporting documentation in June, documented by PPC Land on June 23, 2026. Three deltas matter for anyone who builds reports. The search terms report now has four toggle views: standard search terms, search terms and landing pages from AI Max, search terms from Dynamic Search Ads, and search terms and landing pages from Dynamic Search Ads. Filtering by match type equals AI Max can undercount, because the filter ignores the Other search terms bucket. And the keywords report carries two aggregate rows, Total AI Max expanded matches and Total AI Max landing page matches.
If your client reporting pulls search terms by match type, those queries will silently under-report AI Max activity after migration. Fix the queries now and note the view each number comes from. Our n-gram search term analysis guide shows how to mine the new views once they are live.
6Time the upgrade yourself and watch a four-week window
Google recommends one-click experiments to test AI Max impact before committing, and that is the right mechanism. Upgrade voluntarily, campaign by campaign, starting with low-spend campaigns from your step 1 inventory. Define a kill threshold in advance, for example CPA running 20% above your step 2 baseline for two consecutive weeks at stable volume. A threshold set before the switch is a decision; one set after is a negotiation.
Then hold a four-week watch window per campaign, reviewing search terms and CPA weekly. Google's own reporting doc tells advertisers to evaluate search terms every one to two weeks. The independent evidence below is exactly why the watch window is not optional.
PaidSync runs steps 1, 2, and 5 in one conversation. Inventory, baselines, and search term exports across every connected account.
Get started for free See pricingThe CPA Evidence Cuts Both Ways
Google's number: an average 7% more conversions or conversion value at similar CPA or ROAS for advertisers using AI Max's full feature suite, stated in the upgrade announcement. The original April version of that claim was 14% more conversions, the figure PPC Land quoted from Google's announcement; the live post now says 7%.
The independent numbers are less friendly. The most cited independent dataset is Smarter Ecommerce's analysis of 250+ campaigns, led by Mike Ryan and covered by Search Engine Land on March 5, 2026: a median revenue uplift of 13% alongside a median CPA increase of 16%, with ROAS outcomes ranging from +42% to -35%. Earlier PPC Land coverage from November 2025 documented Smarter Ecommerce's earlier findings showing AI Max conversions at roughly 35% lower ROAS than traditional match types, a four-month test by Xavier Mantica measuring AI Max at $100.37 per conversion versus $43.97 for phrase match, and an analysis by Ezra Sackett of Monks covering about 30,000 search terms in which 99% of AI Max impressions produced zero conversions.
Read this honestly. It is one retail-heavy dataset plus individual tests, not a law of nature. Ryan's own conclusion, per Search Engine Land, was that turning on AI Max is essentially a coin toss: you may see a lift, but efficiency likely won't follow. The +42% to -35% ROAS spread is the real finding: outcomes vary widely by account, which is an argument for step 2 baselines and step 6 experiments, not for refusing to migrate. You do not get to refuse anyway. You only get to choose when and how measured the switch is.
Run the Audit Steps Through PaidSync in One Conversation
Steps 1, 2, and 5 are hours of clicking per account in the Google Ads UI. Through PaidSync's MCP server, they are one conversation with the AI assistant you already use. Ask for every campaign by type across your connected accounts, pull 90-day CPA, ROAS, and conversion baselines, export search terms by cost, and save the sequence as a reusable workflow you can rerun per client before each migration wave.
PaidSync's Google Ads coverage is 140+ tools out of 430+ tools across 13 platforms, and it holds full write access for Google, Meta, and LinkedIn. Every write operation is approval-gated: mutations support a dry run mode, and destructive changes require an explicit confirmation flag. For the migration itself that means you can stage changes, see exactly what would happen, and confirm before anything touches a live campaign. If you want the wider audit pattern beyond DSA, see our guide to running a Google Ads audit with AI.
Small account, one-off check: the Free plan at $0 includes 15 tool calls per month, enough for an inventory pass on one account.
Agency running this per client: Pro starts at $99 per month. Full plans at paidsync.ai/pricing.
Just want a quick waste read first: the ungated Wasted Spend Estimator takes 60 seconds, no signup.
What This Checklist Does Not Do
Honest limits
It cannot stop the upgrade. Google has published no opt-out; the only control anyone has is upgrading voluntarily before their wave. It cannot promise you Google's 7% lift or protect you from the 16% median CPA increase in the retail dataset; both numbers came from other people's accounts, and the documented spread runs from +42% to -35% ROAS. The independent evidence base is retail-heavy, so lead gen accounts are working with thinner published data. And PaidSync does the read and audit legwork, but it does not make the migration decision for you, cannot pause Google's timeline, and its write operations wait for your explicit approval.
Frequently Asked Questions
When exactly will Google force DSA campaigns into AI Max?
Later than most coverage says. Google's April 15, 2026 announcement set September 2026, but the June 11, 2026 update to the same post extended the Dynamic Search Ads sunset and auto-upgrade to February 2027. Two things still happen earlier: campaigns using Automatically Created Assets and campaign-level broad match begin auto-upgrading in September 2026, and per PPC Land's June 23 analysis of Google's rewritten support docs, new DSA campaign creation ends in January 2027. Verified against blog.google on August 1, 2026.
Can I opt out of the AI Max auto-upgrade?
No. Google has published no opt-out. The only control you have is timing: upgrade voluntarily before your wave hits and, in Google's words, you maintain full control over your campaign setup. Wait for the auto-upgrade and Google converts the campaign on its own schedule, with settings it configures to mirror your legacy setup.
Does AI Max raise CPA?
The evidence is disputed and account-dependent. Google reports an average 7% more conversions or conversion value at similar CPA or ROAS with the full feature suite, revised down from an earlier 14% claim. Smarter Ecommerce's analysis of 250+ campaigns found a median revenue uplift of 13% alongside a median CPA increase of 16%, with ROAS outcomes from +42% to -35%. One four-month independent test measured AI Max at $100.37 per conversion versus $43.97 for phrase match. These are documented cases, not a law. Test on your own account with an experiment against a pre-migration baseline.
What happens to my DSA URL exclusions and page feeds?
Do not assume carryover. Rebuild your URL exclusions in the AI Max landing page controls, then open the upgraded campaign and verify every excluded path by hand. Negative keywords still work in AI Max and should be carried over deliberately. As of August 2026, Google has not published a field-by-field mapping you can rely on blindly, so post-upgrade verification is part of the migration, not optional.
What changed in AI Max reporting?
Google rewrote the AI Max reporting documentation, documented by PPC Land on June 23, 2026. The search terms report now has four toggle views: standard search terms, search terms and landing pages from AI Max, search terms from Dynamic Search Ads, and search terms and landing pages from Dynamic Search Ads. Filtering by match type equals AI Max can undercount because the filter ignores the Other search terms bucket. The keywords report gained two aggregate rows, Total AI Max expanded matches and Total AI Max landing page matches. If client reports pull search terms by match type, fix those queries before September.
Can PaidSync run this migration checklist for me?
PaidSync runs the audit steps, inventory, baselines, and search term exports, in one conversation across every account you connect. Its Google Ads coverage is 140+ tools out of 430+ tools across 13 platforms, and every write operation is approval-gated with a dry run mode plus an explicit confirmation flag for destructive changes. What it cannot do: pause Google's auto-upgrade, opt you out, or make the migration decision for you. The Free plan is $0 with 15 tool calls per month. Pro starts at $99 per month.
September is the first wave. Run your DSA inventory this week, not the week before.
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