Google is finally bringing its own AI search technology to users. The company announced in a blog post that it is starting to roll out access to Search Labs, which includes Search Generative Experience (SGE). SGE is an experimental feature of Google’s search engine that uses artificial intelligence to generate contextual answers to complex questions. It is only available to users who have signed up for the waitlist. To sign up, you can visit the Search Labs website and click on the “Sign Up” button.
AI-Powered Search
Google’s new Search Generative Experience is designed to answer longer, time-consuming searches on the go. These queries may not be answered by a single website. Thus, SGE generates an AI-powered “snapshot” of information and insights to answer your question. The snapshot is pulled from multiple sources and summarized by Google. The answer will appear beneath the search bar with a colored background to differentiate it from the usual light/dark theme.
So now, instead of just 10 clickable links on a single page, you’ll see a summary of the most relevant information. It works by first understanding the intent of the user’s search query. Once it understands your intent, it generates a unique summary of the information. The summary is displayed beneath the search bar and includes a link to the original source.
Examples of SGE
Here are some examples of how you can use SGE:
- To learn about new things:
You can search for topics like “Learning ukulele vs guitar” or “Benefits of incorporating your business before freelancing.” Google Search will provide an AI-powered snapshot of the topic, so you can quickly get up to speed.
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- To find quick answers to your questions:
You can search for specific questions like “How to get an old coffee stain out of a wool sweater?” or “How can I renew my passport quickly?” Google Search will provide a variety of results from across the web, so you can find the information you need quickly.
- To discover products and services:
You can also search for specific products or services like “Peel and stick wallpaper for kitchen” or “Bluetooth speaker for a pool party.” Google Search will provide a host of options to choose from, including important considerations for that environment, like water resistance and battery life.
Google is cautious about experimental generative AI. And it will warn you before providing the generated response. SGE will not provide an AI snapshot if there is a lack of information or if Google has low confidence in its response. On the desktop web, Google will surface websites that informed the answer to the right, while it appears as a carousel on mobile.
What makes up Google’s Search Generative Experience?
Corroborate/Expand
SGE provides a button in the top-right corner that allows you to expand the answer and see how it was corroborated. This will show links to the sources that were used to inform the answer.
Conversational mode
At the bottom of the AI-powered snapshot are suggested follow-up questions and the ability to ask your own. This launches Conversational mode, which is a chatbot-like interface that allows you to ask follow-up questions in a natural way. Google will keep in mind previous context and questions when providing new answers.
Shopping + Ads
For buying-related queries, SGE will surface factors that you might want to consider and will suggest options that fit the bill. These suggestions will be accompanied by generated overviews. Google’s Shopping Graph is used to power this feature.
SGE is still under development, but it has the potential to make Google search more powerful and user-friendly.
