Tag: google search

  • Google Search’s new features can help you save money when traveling

    Google Search’s new features can help you save money when traveling

    Travelling provides new experiences and new experiences are the key to keeping stress levels low and happiness levels high. But what do all good trips have in common? That’s right: we take some of the best smartphones on them with us, because they are helpful travel companions.

    How would we make them more helpful though? Well, easy: new Google Search features. Most people are already using the search engine when planning out their trips, so incorporating new tools into it is a simple no brainer.

    And would you look at that? Google was thinking the same thing! The latest update to the platfor has introduced a brand new workflow, consisting of three separate features:

    • Browsing hotels
    • Saving money on flights
    • Discover what the destination holds in store

    Once a user is done with the process, they would effectively have chosen their next travel destination with ease, all from the comfort of their smartphone.

    In order to kick things off, you are expected to search for a location, combined with “hotel”. At that point, Google will present a series of “stories”, as seen on major social media platforms. Each entry will showcase features related to the hotel in question. Once the choice has been made, a helpful button can be tapped to take you straight to that hotel’s booking page.

    Still, you have to get there, and for that we can get help from Google Flights. It monitors flight prices and recognizes if a given ticket price is low, standard or high. The platform will then label the listings it shows accordingly, so that you can pick out the best deal.

    The last thing on the list is choosing what to do once you land and Google can help you optimize that too. If you search for, lets say, a monument, Search will also offer worthwhile sights nearby, so that you can get the most out of your day. Each recommendation also comes with directions and a link to buy tickets if need be.

    Summertime seems far away, but it’ll be here before you know it. If you were hesitant to start planning your trips, because of all the related hassle, this may have been the nudge you needed. Why not take a chill pill and let Google do the heavy lifting?

  • Changes are coming to the Google Search UI

    Changes are coming to the Google Search UI

    The Google Search app user interface is about to get a new look. Google is testing some changes to the app, including a thicker search bar. Icons for voice search and Google Lens will remain on the bar. Also new, besides the girth of the search bar, is a carousel directly underneath with shortcut suggestions such as “Search recent Screenshots from your library,” get help for your homework using your camera and Google Lens, how to identify songs, and more.

    These suggestions can tell you about things that Google Search can do that perhaps you didn’t know about. They also can start the process and get the ball rolling with a single tap on the screen.

    Also new is a bell icon next to your profile picture in the upper right of the screen. Tap on it to see notifications related to all the topics you subscribe to on Google. Other improvements are coming to the app, including showing you search results even before you’ve finished typing. Just to let you know, this is different from showing you suggestions on what to search for as you type as that is currently available on the Google Search app.
    The difference is that with the new feature, Google Search will try to figure out what you are looking for even before you finish typing it into the search bar and will show you results before you are done. If Google has the correct topic, you will shave valuable seconds off of your session with Google Search. If Google is wrong, the time it takes you to look down on the screen to check and type your query out completely will add a few seconds to your Google Search session. So for this to be useful, Google has to nail the algorithm.

    Right now it’s still being determined whether Google is disseminating the changes mentioned above to the Search UI to everyone or if it is part of an A/B test (Google is known to run these often).

  • Google Adds Bahasa Indonesia to its Voice Search

    Google Adds Bahasa Indonesia to its Voice Search

    Got a question for Google? Now you can ask it verbally in Bahasa Indonesia in even the most casual language.

    The search engine giant just added Indonesian to its voice-search feature in the hope of improving user’s access to information, said Sandy Tantra, consumer marketing officer for Google Indonesia. It’s the latest Google technology to be adapted for this nation of 250 million people, where Internet access remains low but is increasing. Indonesian becomes the 46th language available under voice-search, which also includes French, Japanese, Turkish and Hebrew.