Mountain View, California — Amid growing concern about the privacy implications of location-based services, the move is latest in location-based features for the search giant. Google on Friday announced a new “Nearby” location-based search filtering capabilities to desktop computers that will empower users to search for specific places in their immediate area.
In January, the company added “Near Me Now” suggestions to the mobile homepage. Earlier this month, they rolled out “Nearby” suggestions to search results within Google Maps. And now, the main Google search results is embellished with the “Nearby” treatment.
“Beginning today, we have added the capability to refine your searches with the ‘Nearby‘ tool in the Search Options panel,” explained Google product manager Jackie Bavaro in a blog post. “One of the really helpful things about this tool is that it works geographically — not just with keywords — so you do not have to worry about adding ‘Minneapolis’ to your query and missing Web pages that only say ‘St. Paul’ or ‘Twin Cities.’”
This time, “Nearby” has been included in the “Search Options” panel. The feature can be located simply by clicking the “Show Options…” link on the regular results page, scanning down to the second “All results” section, and clicking the link “Nearby.”
Using this new tool will enable users to make local-centric searches (like “things to do on st. patrick’s day,” “food blogs,” “farmers market,” or “dmv”), which will return information, events, and businesses actually relevant (because nearby) to the user making the search.
Click on “Nearby,” the previously returned results will then change to a new set of results specifically centered on one’s location, determined by IP address. You can also customize your location in the Search Options panel:
“Location has become an important part of the way we search,” writes Bavaro, as she offers just one possible use for the new search tool. “If you are a foodie looking for restaurant details, food blogs or the closest farmer’s market, location can be vital to helping you find the right information.”
Google has been applying users’ locations to offer search results for quite some time, but this signifies the first time the search engine is actually letting users dictate when they want it to be used to retrieve results for specific queries. In local search, Google is generally pretty good at delivering nearby results anyway, but giving users this added little bit of control can’t hurt, and simply gives users another way to refine their results to match their preferences.
Users can view results by their default location, or set a custom location. The feature is currently only available on Google.com in English.