Microsoft launched an AI Performance report in Bing Webmaster Tools as a public preview on 10 February 2026. On 16 June 2026 it added four more preview reports: Intents, Topics, Citation Share and Compare. They are the first official dashboards from a major search engine showing how often a site is cited in AI-generated answers. They are free, and many UK websites still have not verified their site with Bing.
Key takeaways
- Bing Webmaster Tools now has free AI reports showing how often your site is cited in Copilot and Bing's AI-generated answers.
- The AI Performance report shows citations and grounding queries but no click data, so it is not a traffic report.
- StatCounter put Bing at 18.33% of UK desktop search and 6.08% across all platforms in September 2026.
- Verify your site in Bing Webmaster Tools, submit your XML sitemap, turn on IndexNow and check robots.txt does not block Bingbot.
What happened
AI Performance report (10 February 2026)
The report shows how your content appears as a source across Microsoft Copilot, AI-generated summaries in Bing, and "select partner integrations". According to Microsoft's announcement, it includes:
| Metric | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Total Citations | How often your content was shown as a source in AI answers during the period |
| Average Cited Pages | Average number of unique pages from your site cited per day |
| Grounding queries | A sample of the phrases the AI used when retrieving your content |
| Page-level citation activity | Citation counts for individual URLs |
| Visibility trends | Citation activity over time |
Microsoft notes that Average Cited Pages "does not indicate ranking or authority". The announcement does not include click data, so this is a citation report, not a traffic report.
Intents, Topics, Citation Share and Compare (16 June 2026)
Microsoft's June post said the four new features were "beginning to roll out in preview within Bing Webmaster Tools globally":
- Intents sorts grounding queries into categories such as Informational, Commercial, Navigational, Research and Local.
- Topics groups related grounding queries into themes.
- Citation Share shows your percentage of all citations for a given grounding query. Microsoft calls it "an observational metric", not a ranking, and it does not reveal competitor domains or traffic share.
- Compare overlays a previous period, such as the last 30 days against the 30 days before.
These are still preview features. Microsoft has not given a date for general availability.
IndexNow keeps growing
IndexNow is the open protocol that Bing and Yandex launched in October 2021. It lets a site tell participating search engines immediately when a URL is added, updated or deleted. On 19 May 2025 Microsoft announced that Shopify supports IndexNow, that Milestone had built it into its CMS, and that Amazon planned to start adopting it in mid-June 2025. Microsoft now recommends IndexNow over its older Content Submission API for most sites. In the February 2026 AI Performance announcement, it again recommended IndexNow, saying: "Accurate and up to date content is important for inclusion and citation in AI-generated answers."
What this means for UK businesses
Google dominates UK search, but Bing's share is not trivial, especially on desktop. StatCounter's figures for September 2026 show:
| UK, September 2026 | Bing | Yahoo | DuckDuckGo | Ecosia | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| All platforms | 91.39% | 6.08% | 1.32% | 0.65% | 0.30% |
| Desktop only | 75.99% | 18.33% | 3.87% | 1.08% | 0.45% |
Nearly one in five desktop searches in the UK goes through Bing. That matters for B2B firms, professional services and anyone whose customers search from work PCs. StatCounter measures page views from sites running its tracker, so treat these figures as estimates rather than exact counts.
The new reports are also the only first-party view a UK small business can currently get of its visibility in Microsoft's AI answers, and they cost nothing. If you ignore Bing Webmaster Tools, you lose both the classic search data and the AI citation data.
What to do now
- Verify your site in Bing Webmaster Tools. If you already use Google Search Console, you can import your verified sites from there instead of setting them up again.
- Submit your XML sitemap and check that it lists only canonical, indexable URLs. Our XML sitemap guide explains how.
- Turn on IndexNow. Many platforms and SEO plugins support it. Otherwise, host the key file and ping the endpoint whenever URLs change.
- Check robots.txt does not block Bingbot. Microsoft says Bing respects content owner preferences expressed through robots.txt, so an over-broad rule can remove you from both search and AI answers. Our robots.txt guide and free robots.txt generator can help.
- Review the AI Performance report monthly. Look for pages that are indexed but rarely cited and make them clearer. Microsoft suggests clear headings, tables, FAQ sections and up-to-date facts.
- Run a technical health check. MakeItFlow can run a free website audit covering robots.txt, sitemap, canonical tags, titles, page speed and security headers. These are the basics that affect crawling by every search engine.
Want a quick read on how Bing-ready your site is? MakeItFlow checks the technical basics that Bing and Google both rely on, including robots.txt, your XML sitemap, canonical tags and page speed, in one free scan. Paid plans re-scan on a schedule, so a broken sitemap or an over-broad robots.txt rule is caught before it costs you visibility.
Frequently asked questions
What is Bing's search market share in the UK?
According to StatCounter, Bing had 6.08% of UK search across all platforms and 18.33% on desktop in September 2026. Google had 91.39% and 75.99% respectively.
Does the Bing AI Performance report show clicks from Copilot?
No. Microsoft's announcements describe citation metrics only: Total Citations, Average Cited Pages, grounding queries, page-level citations and trends. Citation Share is explicitly not a measure of traffic share.
Does IndexNow help with Google?
Google is not listed as a participating search engine for IndexNow. For Google, keep using an accurate sitemap and Search Console. IndexNow is still worth enabling for Bing and the other engines that support it. If you are seeing indexing gaps in Google, see our guide on crawled but not indexed pages.
Related reading
- Adobe Completes Semrush Deal: What It Means for SEO Teams: Adobe closed its $1.9bn Semrush acquisition on 28 April 2026. What it means for the SEO tools agencies and in-house teams use, and what to check now.
- Bing Topics Portfolio: New AI Performance Report Explained: Bing added Topics Portfolio to its AI Performance report on 13 October 2026. What it shows about your AI citations and how websites can use it to plan content.
Sources
- Introducing AI Performance in Bing Webmaster Tools Public Preview (Bing Webmaster Blog, 10 February 2026)
- New AI Visibility Insights in Bing Webmaster Tools: Intents, Topics, Citation Share, Compare (Bing Blog, 16 June 2026)
- IndexNow Drives Smarter and Faster Content Discovery (Bing Webmaster Blog, 19 May 2025)
- Search engine market share, United Kingdom (StatCounter)
- Desktop search engine market share, United Kingdom (StatCounter)
Written by the MakeItFlow team
We build the website audit these guides are based on. Every fact is checked against the primary sources listed above and this guide was last reviewed on 25 October 2026 . How we research and check
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