Google AI-Powered Search Intros Additional Coding Capabilities and AI Summaries on Articles

Google Search is rolling out additional generative AI features in its AI-powered Search experience dubbed Search Generative Experience (SGE). The new updates will include AI summaries while browsing long-form content, coding improvements and definitions of unfamiliar words within AI-generated responses.

Google launched SGE less than three months ago and has since included more updates to the experience including visual support in overviews. According to Google, the new upgrades will help users learn better and make sense of information on the web. In a blog post, the company further explains that the new feature updates will help users better understand complicated concepts, boosting their coding skills or previewing definitions of unfamiliar terms in a topic.

SGE while browsing

One of the key features Google is introducing to its AI search is the SGE while browsing experience. This feature is specifically designed to help users better engage with long-form content.

This feature will provide AI-generated key summaries on articles with links directing to the specific sections directly on the page. In addition, users can dig deeper with “Explore on page”, where they can find questions the article answers and jump to the relevant sections to learn more.

The feature is an early experiment in Search Labs and will roll out automatically to users already opted into SGE. It is also available as a standalone experiment in Search Labs for users who haven’t opt into SGE. It is currently available on the Google app on iOS and Android with plans to roll out to Chrome on the desktop in the coming days.

This feature is currently only available on free articles online and does not provide key summaries on articles marked as paywalled. Google claims that they are working on learning what works best for publishers and users as the experiment evolves.

Definitions within AI-generated responses

This feature will enable users to get definitions of unfamiliar terms in complex topics as well as provide related diagrams and images to the topic. This may become helpful especially when you are researching something or need an explanation of a concept and come across a term you need more clarification on.

This feature will be available on AI-generated responses to various topics or questions related to science, history, and economics among others. This update will allow users to hover over certain words to preview definitions and see related images and diagrams on the topic.

Coding Improvements

Google is introducing additional capabilities to SGE to easier understand and debug generated code. The company points out that this feature will help new or experienced programmers learn more about coding information in AI overviews.

SGE currently provides AI-generated overviews to help with several programming tasks including answers to how-to questions as well see suggested code snippets for common tasks. The new updates will provide syntax highlighting to color-code segments of code in overviews. According to Google, this will make it faster and easier to identify elements like keywords, comments and strings allowing users to better digest the generated code.

Google Search recently introduced new features to help users stay in control of their private information, privacy and online safety. With the new updates users can easily find and remove any personal information when it appears online including explicit images.