Ask HN: Is it just me or did Google search recently get a lot worse?

#1

Post by alan_wade » Mon, Feb 11, 2019, 8:46 AM UTC

Past few days(weeks?) I find myself more and more frustrated with google search. It seems to frequently omit the most important keywords I'm typing. I constantly have to click "Must include 'Keyword'", because more than half the links on the first page miss it, even if it's the first one out of 3 words in my query.

I'm not the kind of person who thinks about search quality, this is the first time in my life I have ever noticed it being frustrating.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or did Google search recently get a lot worse?

#2

Post by EGKW » Mon, Feb 11, 2019, 9:11 AM UTC

Totally! Actually not 'worse' as such, but search results are more centered around earnings, rather than around providing information. You can't blame them for that, but by shifting focus they can expect a shift in public too.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or did Google search recently get a lot worse?

#3

Post by enz » Mon, Feb 11, 2019, 9:20 AM UTC

I have the same feeling, I have to click "must include keyword..." to get better results. I thought it was because I use google.co.jp since I moved to Japan a few weeks ago, so I was guessing Google tried too hard to correlate the results with my new geographical area. It seems I'm not the only one.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or did Google search recently get a lot worse?

#4

Post by whateveracct » Mon, Feb 11, 2019, 9:58 AM UTC

Sounds like someone in Google had a successful feature launch :) good for them on delivering something to production!

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or did Google search recently get a lot worse?

#5

Post by synesso » Mon, Feb 11, 2019, 10:00 AM UTC

Now you mention it, yes. I've been seeing this for a few weeks. It seems often the most salient word in my search phrase is ignored.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or did Google search recently get a lot worse?

#6

Post by s9w » Mon, Feb 11, 2019, 10:01 AM UTC

Not sure if it was in the last weeks.. I would say in the last months. But google searches without verbatim mode are increasingly useless.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or did Google search recently get a lot worse?

#7

Post by anc84 » Mon, Feb 11, 2019, 10:03 AM UTC

Absolutely it got even worse in the past few weeks after an earlier, perceived drop a couple of months ago.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or did Google search recently get a lot worse?

#8

Post by Jedi72 » Mon, Feb 11, 2019, 10:05 AM UTC

It seems only a matter of time until Google is just an interactive yellow pages. Why would you spend millions trying to index peoples personal blogs etc. when companies will pay thousands for the spot in the results and give you the link to put up? All they need to do is maintain their position as the default internet portal.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or did Google search recently get a lot worse?

#9

Post by jim-jim-jim » Mon, Feb 11, 2019, 10:10 AM UTC

Glad I'm not alone. It's so bad I'm actually _using_ DuckDuckGo these days, instead of instinctively typing in g! before all my queries like I usually do.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or did Google search recently get a lot worse?

#10

Post by x38iq84n » Mon, Feb 11, 2019, 10:11 AM UTC

I have had the same feeling for months and not limited to Google, sadly DDG suffers from the same. Search result quality has been getting worse and my search queries contain more and more quotes just to get back to a previous level. What I miss is a tick box for "power users" to disable spelling suggestions, search terms omission and similar "features".