Google has quietly expanded the graphical calculator feature in Google’s search results to be 3D and animated.

Now if you search for certain math equations, the graphical display will be 3D and animated.

Google shared this news less than an hour ago on their Google+ page and math junkies (mostly Googlers) are eating it up.

This does one-up WolframAlpha‘s graphic calculator by making the free graphs animated. I believe the paid version does offer animated graphs.

Here is a video:

Postscript: Google has announced this on their blog a couple hours later:

Just type any real two variable function into Google to see a dynamic, interactive, three dimensional plot. Click anywhere in the graph to rotate it to check out different angles, or scale the view by zooming in or out, or by editing the range in your equation or in the lower-right legend box. For example, if you’re a student studying advanced calculus, the ability to see a three dimensional graph will help you get a better visualization for real two variable functions.

This feature is enabled by a technology called WebGL, which we’re using for the first time in Google Search. WebGL is a new web technology that brings hardware-accelerated 3D graphics to the browser without the need to install additional software. This technology is currently supported on modern web browsers such as Chrome and Firefox.

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About The Author: Barry Schwartz is Search Engine Land's News Editor and owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry's personal blog is named Cartoon Barry and he can be followed on Twitter here. For more background information on Barry, see his full bio over here. See more articles by Barry Schwartz

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