AI engines

Every project tracks its buyer questions on its own set of AI engines. You choose that set under Project settings, then AI engines, within the number your plan allows. The same card shows what your connected answer feed is running right now, so a save never changes your data quietly.

You come here when you set up a project, when you change plan, or when the schedule says an engine is off. The rail foot on every project page shows what the platform is doing for the project at this moment, including the checks that collect from these engines.

Which engines you can track

The catalog holds eight answer engines: ChatGPT, Gemini, AI Overviews, AI Mode, Claude, Perplexity, Copilot and Grok. A few further engines appear on the grid as not available. A card that nothing can collect shows its reason in place of its sentence, and it cannot be switched on. The reasons: your Ahrefs feed is not connected yet (one of the eight, on a project with no feed), no collection route exists for it yet, it is not available for our weekly sample yet, or it is an errand-running agent rather than an answer surface and not comparable with the rest.

Each project picks its own set. The card's lead says so: "Choose the answer engines this project tracks. Each project picks its own set. They are not shared across your projects." Nine engines on Agency means nine on every project, not nine shared between them.

How many each plan allows

A trial runs on Growth's limits, so it tracks up to 6 per project. The count sits at the top right of the card: "4 of 6 on your plan", or "4 on · your plan sets no limit". Engines over the count are paused, never deleted. The full table of limits is in Plans and limits.

What you see on the card

• A grid of toggle cards, one per engine: logo, name, a check when selected, and one sentence about what this project does with it.
• Small status lines under the sentence when they apply: "Paused: over your plan", and the report's live state. A selected engine the report runs reads "Running in your feed". Switch it off and the line turns to warning color: "Saving switches this off" on a report the platform manages, or "Still on in your report" on a report you own.
• The info hint "What each card says" explains both lines: the sentence names the route the engine is collected by (your own Ahrefs feed, our weekly sample, or both); the small line is your Ahrefs report as read back on the last update.
• Notices above the grid, when they apply. At the count, owners and admins see: "You are using every engine the Growth plan includes. Agency tracks more." with an "Upgrade" button that opens Billing. Over it: "2 engines paused. Brand includes 3, and you have more selected. They are kept, not deleted. Drop one below, or upgrade, and they start collecting again." On a report you own that runs more than you collect: "Your own Brand Radar report is running 2 engines this project does not collect. We never change a report you manage yourself." Before a first read-back: "We have not read your feed's own engine list yet. It is read back on the next scheduled update."
• The button "Save engines", or "Save this selection" before a first save, with "Unsaved changes" beside it once you have tapped a card.

The sentence under each engine

When both routes cover an engine, " + our weekly sample" is appended.

How to choose a project's engines

1. Open Project settings, then AI engines, and read the count and each card's two lines.
2. Tap cards on or off. Save stays off until you change something.
3. Stay within the count. Over it, Save is disabled and the note says how many to remove: "Growth tracks 6 engines per project. Remove 2 to save."
4. Press "Save engines". The toast reads "Engines saved." When the change could not reach your feed, the toast says so instead, for example: "Saved, but Ahrefs did not accept the change (…). Your next daily update will try again."

Before a first save the note reads "This is what the project collects today. Change one to make it your choice." Nothing changes until you tap a card and save.

Two routes to the answers

Your answer feed is an Ahrefs Brand Radar report. For a report the platform created for you, your choice is written into the report on save, and the daily data update keeps the two in line. For a report you connected yourself, nothing is ever written: you turn engines on and off in your Ahrefs account, and the card only reports what it runs. See The answer feed and data updates.

The weekly sample is the platform's own run of the AI engines for your tracked prompts. On the schedule it is the row "AI answers run", Mondays at 07:30 UTC. It runs alongside your feed and is never mixed into the same line. Only enrolled projects have it; others read "not enrolled".

Cadence per engine

You choose which engines, not how often. The cadence belongs to the report and is shown, not edited. It appears under the "Data update" row of the Schedule tab (Project settings, then Data), on the console's Schedule card, and on the Pipeline tab, where "Collect fresh answers from" lists the engines grouped by cadence.

• Platform-managed report: "ChatGPT, Gemini weekly · Perplexity daily. You pick these under AI engines in project settings." With every engine off: "No engines are switched on. Nothing new will arrive until you turn one on under AI engines in project settings."
• Your own report: the same clauses, then "Set in your own Ahrefs report, not here."
• Over the plan: "2 engines in the report are not on your plan." followed by what switches them off: the next update, picking this project's engines, or turning them off in your own report.

A report the platform creates starts with ChatGPT, AI Overviews and Perplexity, weekly, unless the project already has a saved choice, which it then follows. An engine you switch on runs weekly; one already running keeps the cadence it had. The line is absent until the engine list has been read back on a scheduled update.

Paused engines

An engine is paused when your selection is over the plan's count, usually after a move to a smaller plan. It is kept, not deleted, and nothing collects it. Its card reads "Paused: over your plan" and "collects when you drop another engine or upgrade". Save is refused while the selection is over the count.

The What stays picker in Billing covers projects and prompts, not engines. Engines pause on each project by themselves, and the card marks which ones. To bring one back, drop another engine and save, or upgrade. An upgrade restores them without retyping anything.

Engine status in the rail foot

The foot of the left rail (the bottom bar on a phone) shows what the platform is doing for this project right now. Spot sits beside two short lines.

• Working: the task's name over what it is doing, for example "Checking for new data" over "Checking the feed for new answers", or "AI pipeline" over its current step. Other names you will see: "Daily upkeep", "Syncing prompts to Ahrefs", "First-party sampling" (the weekly sample), "Finding contacts", "Writing a page". When more runs at once, the tip adds how many ("2 more running"). A thin progress strip along the top edge shows how far along when a real ratio exists.
• A warning mark appears when nothing has moved for a while; its tip says how long and what it may be waiting on.
• After a task you started finishes, the result is held: "AI pipeline finished" followed by a count of what it enriched, "Promoting to outreach finished · 3 drafted · 1 need a contact", "… stopped" with the error, or "… canceled". Finished results stay about a minute; failures stay until you dismiss them with the small X ("Dismiss this result").
• Quiet: "All quiet", with Spot snoozing.
• "Engine room" opens the drawer where the work in progress and held results appear in full. See The engine room and pipeline. With the rail collapsed, Spot alone carries the whole sentence as its tip. On a phone, the sentence runs across the bottom bar while anything is running.

Good to know

• Owners and admins change engines. Members see the same cards and "Changing engines needs admin access."
• During setup, the Tracking step says "The engines are chosen per project." and its info hint "Engines" adds "Change them any time in the project's settings, under AI engines."
• If the selection cannot be read: "Engine selection is still switching on for this workspace. Your data keeps arriving on the engines it already uses."
• Ask Spot, or your own agent over MCP, for "Engine mention rates" (how often each engine names you over a window of complete days, with a margin) and "What engines searched" (the searches the engines ran while answering your prompts). Both are reads; nothing changes. See Spot, the in-app agent.