Naver launches AI Tab, overhauling its search interface for first time in 8 years

Naver has put AI at the center of its mobile search experience, overhauling the interface for the first time in eight years. The "Green Dot" — a fixture of the Naver app's search home screen since 2018 — has been replaced by AI Tab, a conversational search service powered by generative AI. The redesign transforms what had been a simple query-and-results experience into one that connects conversational exploration with shopping, location discovery and reservations.

The move is part of Naver's strategy to consolidate its dominance in the domestic search market as global technology giants step up their own AI search offerings.

Naver officially launched AI Tab on Friday, saying it would expand AI search capabilities across both its mobile and PC platforms.

Users can now access conversational search directly by tapping the newly placed AI Tab button in the search bar. The launch extends to all users a beta service that had been available only to Naver Plus membership subscribers since April.

At the heart of the redesign is the transformation of the Green Dot. Introduced during a 2018 app overhaul, the Green Dot had served as a mobile search hub consolidating voice, image and location-based search in one place. As generative AI search gained traction, however, Naver shifted the search home screen's focal point from the Green Dot to AI Tab. Smart Lens, the multimodal search tool previously part of the Green Dot, has been moved alongside the search bar, while music search has been folded into AI Tab.

AI Tab is designed to go beyond answering questions and guide users toward action within Naver's own services. When searching for a restaurant or cafe in a specific area, for example, users can view relevant information alongside a map and available reservation times — all within the same response — eliminating the need to navigate separately to a map or booking screen. Starting in July, users will also be able to move from the conversation window beneath AI Briefing directly into AI Tab to continue their search.

Early user data has been encouraging. AI Tab surpassed 4 million cumulative users within about two months of its beta launch. Click-through rates on product and place cards each exceeded 20 percent, and users who visited AI Tab 11 or more times clicked on products 2.7 times more and on places twice as often as those who visited only once.

Search share trends have also moved in Naver's favor since it strengthened its AI search offering. According to market research firm Internet Trend, Naver's average search share was 63.82 percent from Jan. 1 to April 26 — before the AI Tab beta launch — and rose to 66.34 percent from April 27 to June 17, after the launch. On May 24, it briefly exceeded 80 percent. Industry observers attribute the increase in Naver search usage to the expansion of AI features including AI Tab and AI Briefing.

Alongside the official launch, Naver applied a specialized model optimized for large-scale search services. Dubbed a "product-native LLM," the model builds on the existing HyperCLOVA X foundation and incorporates Naver's service scenarios, vertical data and user feedback. It is designed to process queries, summarize answers and call tools faster within the search environment.

Naver plans to broaden AI Tab's scope in the months ahead. In the second half of the year, the company will introduce a feature that recommends real estate listings based on a user's budget and preferred neighborhood. A health agent feature is also in development that will suggest lifestyle and health management tips when users upload their medical checkup results. Before the end of the year, Naver will also integrate AI Tab into its Whale browser, extending the service to the web.

Industry observers see Naver's approach — combining AI search with its established portal ecosystem — as an attempt to differentiate itself from global AI services. The strategy targets a growing pattern in which users get a broad answer from foreign AI services such as ChatGPT, Gemini or Claude, then turn to a domestic portal to verify local or up-to-date information. Naver aims to build a search experience that overseas AI services cannot easily replicate, drawing on its deep reserves of lifestyle-oriented data — spanning shopping, local services, finance and health — as well as domestic content.

"AI Tab is a prime example of Naver's unrivaled service ecosystem, data infrastructure and AI capabilities coming together," said Kim Gwang-hyeon, Naver's chief data and content officer. "Now that tens of millions of Naver users can access AI Tab directly from the search bar, we will continue to expand a differentiated agent experience that connects exploration all the way through to action."