Google Search Ads Benchmarks by Industry

These are Google Search benchmarks — ads priced per click — so the meaningful cost here is CPC (cost per click), not CPM. Each row shows four numbers for an industry: CPC (what you pay per click), CTR (the share of people who click after seeing your ad), conversion rate (the share of clicks that turn into a lead or sale), and CPL (cost per lead — the all-in cost of one converted click).

Find the industry closest to your business and compare each column against your own Google Ads account. Across all industries the averages sit at roughly a $5.42 CPC, a 6.6% CTR, an 8.2% conversion rate and a $66.69 cost per lead — a useful baseline to hold your own row against.

Cost per click is driven mostly by how much a customer is worth. The priciest clicks are in legal (~$9.87), home & home improvement (~$8.33) and dentists (~$8.00) — industries where a single new client is worth thousands, so advertisers bid hard for the same searches.

The cheapest clicks are in arts & entertainment (~$1.63), restaurants & food (~$2.05) and travel (~$2.14), where each customer is worth less and competition is lighter. That's a roughly six-fold gap between the top and bottom of the table — which is exactly why an all-industry average tells you little without your own industry's row.

The columns form a chain: your CTR turns impressions into clicks, your conversion rate turns clicks into leads, and CPL is the result of all of it plus your CPC. Reading them together explains a lot the CPC alone can't.

• A high CPC isn't necessarily bad — automotive repair pays a mid-range CPC but converts at over 15%, so its cost per lead stays low.
• A high CTR doesn't guarantee cheap leads — arts & entertainment has the highest CTR (~12.75%) but only a modest conversion rate, because entertainment searches get browsed more than bought.
• Legal pairs a high CPC with the highest cost per lead (~$131.63) — expensive clicks that don't always convert quickly.

So judge a campaign on the whole row — CPC, CTR, conversion rate and CPL — not one number in isolation.

One caveat worth stating: this table covers Google Search — text ads on the results page, priced per click. Google's other formats behave very differently. Display and YouTube are usually priced per impression (CPM) or per view and run far cheaper per unit, while Shopping ads have their own dynamics. If you run those, don't judge them against these Search figures.

These figures come from WordStream / LocaliQ, compiled from thousands of real Google Ads and Microsoft Ads accounts and refreshed about once a year. Because they're averages across many advertisers, treat each number as the middle of a wide range rather than a hard target.

This page is the raw data. For how to decide whether your number is actually good — and what a click is worth to you — see our guide on what a good CPC is, or work out your own figures with the CPC calculator and CTR calculator.