Google tests search that delivers results as you type

August 22, 2010 | Dean Takahashi

Google is developing a new kind of search capability that delivers the results instantly as you type the letters.

The new experiment was discovered by search engine optimization (SEO) consultant Rob Ousbey, who noticed the results being delivered instantly and then recorded a video to show it. Google confirmed to TechCrunch that the video is real. It will be interesting to see if the new capability is launched as a standard part of Google’s search engine. It could save us all time as we type familiar searches where we know that the instantly-delivered search result is most likely the one we want to click on.

You’ll notice in the video that the search results change as more letters are added and the terms of the search become different. But it may not be for everyone, as limited CPU power or bandwidth is likely to slow live updates down for searches of this kind.

Gabriel Stricker, a Google spokesman, told Techcrunch, “At any given time we are running between 50-200 search experiments. You can learn more on our blog.”

Next Story: Politics, sex crimes, and Wikileaks
Previous Story: Bumped.in gives you an excuse to chat up fellow commuters

Twitter

Facebook

Google Buzz

Digg

StumbleUpon

Delicious

Google

More...

Tags: real time search, search

About the Author, Dean Takahashi

Dean is lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat. He covers video games, security, chips and a variety of other subjects. Dean previously worked at the San Jose Mercury News, the Wall Street Journal, the Red Herring, the Los Angeles Times, the Orange County Register and the Dallas Times Herald. He is the author of two books, Opening the Xbox and the Xbox 360 Uncloaked. Follow him on Twitter at @deantak, and follow VentureBeat on Twitter at @venturebeat.

http://www.professionalsofttech.com Chintan Kotadia

Nice article. Gone through and each words of your article. Seems interesting! Thanks for sharing it.
DGDanforth

What an utter waste of network bandwidth!More frills with no content.Keep it simple …
StandingO

They just never can let well enough alone, can they? What's next–Google anticipates what you're going to want to know and posts it as soon as you sit down? It's just like MSWord 6.0 was fine for me–as was Windows 3.1–but they kept on tricking it all up to the point where who gives a rip anymore?
http://www.socialcubix.com/services/facebook-connect Facebook Connect Integration

Awesome! Google making life more easier, as always
http://twitter.com/MarcusMcConnell Marcus McConnell

That would be a serious change for Adwords metrics. What counts as an impression with this type of search box? One second pause? You could potentially get 5+ impressions for ads and then a click = 20% click through where as the old way would be 1 impression and 1 click for 100% click through.
http://twitter.com/NickFisherman Nick Fisherman

I don't understand. I feel like I've been using this feature forever. Are some people not getting this? I love it because when I ask what might be a silly question, I can type it slowly and see if a significant number of people have also decided that it was an important enough thing to ask.