Google ditches Instant, one of the search engine’s fastest features

Users who aren't sure what it is will definitely notice its absence

Aatif Sulleyman
Saturday 29 July 2017 13:09 BST
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Google says it wants to make search 'more fluid on all devices'
Google says it wants to make search 'more fluid on all devices'

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Google has killed off Instant, one of its search engine’s quickest features.

When it launched back in 2010, it was hailed as "the future of search" and the company also described it as “search-before-you-type”.

Google said the main benefit it would offer users was saving them time.

Instant showed the results of predicted search terms before you’d hit the Enter key or even finished typing.

Suggestions will continue to appear under the search bar as you type, but now you actually need to select one of them or complete your query in order to see any results.

“We launched Google Instant back in 2010 with the goal to provide users with the information they need as quickly as possible, even as they typed their searches on desktop devices,” Google told Search Engine Land.

“Since then, many more of our searches happen on mobile, with very different input and interaction and screen constraints.

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“With this in mind, we have decided to remove Google Instant, so we can focus on ways to make Search even faster and more fluid on all devices.”

When Instant launched, Marissa Mayer, who was then Google’s vice president of search products and user experience, said: “The user benefits of Google Instant are many — but the primary one is time saved. Our testing has shown that Google Instant saves the average searcher two to five seconds per search.

“That may not seem like a lot at first, but it adds up. With Google Instant, we estimate that we’ll save our users 11 hours with each passing second!”

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