Google kills off instant search results as you type

Back in 2010, Google launched what at the time seemed like an amazing innovation in the search field: instant results. Google Instant has, for the past seven years or so, showed you the first page of results while you were typing your query. On computers, this has helped you save a lot of time coupled with the search giant's instant suggestions. But on mobile Google Instant makes no sense, given that your keyboard is taking up half your screen while you're typing, and most of the rest is obscured by your fingers anyway. And over 50% of all Google searches are made on mobile devices nowadays.

So, in order to make Google Search behave in a consistent manner across all platforms, Instant has to die. The feature has effectively been killed off today. The company has issued the following statement on the matter:

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

From now on, when you type your query in the Google search box on a computer, you'll only see the familiar suggestions popping up - the search results page won't load under them anymore. You will need to either click on a suggestion or hit Enter for a results page to actually be displayed.

Source | Via