New Update to Google Trends Adds YouTube, Shopping, News and Images

Josh Wehniainen - November 29, 2017

On Monday Google announced the addition of new filters, including Shopping and YouTube, to their Google Trends tool. With this update, users are able to go beyond web search when looking into trending topics and more.

Image Credit: Google

Google Trends has always been a helpful tool to use when researching what’s trending. From seeing trends in real time or dialing down to a specific date range, Google Trends has given a lot of helpful, sometimes actionable, insights into what users are searching for on the web. The downside, though, was that the data had always been limited to just web search.

That has changed, as of 11/27/17, when Google announced on their blog that they have added News, Shopping, Images and YouTube into their Google Trends tool. Now, with this new update, you are able to go deeper into what is trending in real time, not just on web search, but through Google’s other popular search services.

This can also show you different, more insightful results than previously seen in the tool. In an example Google gave, using a search for Taylor Swift, you see how the trends change depending on which search service you filter your results by.

“We search in different ways on different platforms,” Google’s Simon Rogers explained. “So, when you look at the search on YouTube, you can see the spike in searches for video of Taylor’s performance on The Tonight Show.”

Image Credit: Google

“But switch it to Google Images and you can see a 700 percent spike in searches for Saturday Night Live, after her performance on the show.”

Image Credit: Google

Though the example by Rogers may not have any relevance to trends in your industry, it gives a good example of how something trending on Google’s web search, or YouTube, could be different from what is trending on Images, News or Shopping.

Although not ground breaking, this update to Google Trends helps us understand more about what users are searching for, not just through the traditional web search, but through many different channels using Google’s search services.

Interested in seeing these features in action? Simply visit Google Trends and start searching!