Earlier, Twitter hinted at a big search overhaul to come, and now the company has unveiled what exactly that entails.
First, Twitter is launching search autocomplete and “people you follow” search results to Twitter.com.
“In addition to recent improvements like related query suggestions, spelling corrections and more relevant search results, these updates make it even easier to immediately get closer to the things you care about,” says Twitter engineer Frost Li. “Search autocomplete shows you the most likely terms for your query as you enter it — especially useful if you’re trying to follow the hashtag for an event or you’re looking for a certain Twitter account. You can select your query from the drop-down menu even before you finish typing it.”
“After you enter your search, you’ll find the most relevant Tweets, articles, accounts, images and videos for your query,” adds Li.
Autocomplete is currently rolling out.
Auto-complete is ON! Super excited in the war room now! 🙂 http://t.co/pPgWUxmz
Twitter search will also now automatically show results for intended queries when terms are misspelled.
If a users searches for a topic for which people use multiple terms, Twitter will provide suggestions for terms where the majority of the conversation is happening. When users search for names, they’ll see results mentioning the person’s real name and their Twitter account name.
Finally, there’s a new personalized search element to the product, with results from people you follow.
“In addition to seeing ‘All’ or ‘Top’ Tweets for your search, you can also now see Tweets about a given topic from only the people you follow when you select the ‘People you follow’ view,” says Li. “Viewing Tweets about a topic from just the people you follow is a great way to find useful information and join the conversation.”
The related search suggestions, search autocomplete and spelling corrections are also available on Twitter’s Android and iPhone apps.
It’s worth noting that some people have been seeing some of these features for weeks.
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