The majority of searches now end without a click, and AI answers push the share higher. That doesn't make visibility worthless — it changes what you win: brand impressions, citation credibility, and capture of the smaller set of clicks that remain (which skew high-intent).
The strategic response is twofold: structure content to be the cited source (AEO), and design pages so the click that does happen lands on clear next steps rather than the answer the searcher already got.