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Google’s Knowledge Graph Gets Smarter With Comparisons & Filters

Matt McGee on September 26, 2013 at 2:59 pm

google-knowledge-mortar-board-graduation Google’s Knowledge Graph is a little smarter today with the addition of filters and a way to compare two Knowledge Graph items side-by-side.

These are some of the Google search updates that the company announced today at a media event celebrating its 15th birthday, and explained in more detail on Google’s Inside Search blog.

Knowledge Graph Comparisons

Google spoke today about being able to process more complex queries, and part of that is evident in the new comparisons feature that presents Knowledge Graph facts side-by-side.

On both the desktop and mobile devices, you can do searches like “compare the space needle and empire state building” or just “space needle versus empire state building” and Google presents some basic points of comparison. Here are the desktop and mobile results for this kind of search:

Desktop

Mobile (iPhone)

The data is the same on both. As you can see, the Knowledge Graph comparison doesn’t show the heights of these two landmarks even though the individual Knowledge Graph cards for each has that information. Sadly, searches like “compare the height of the space needle and the height of the empire state building” don’t bring up this comparison feature so — at the moment — there’s no way to quick compare the height. I suspect Google gets more searches asking about the height of these buildings than the “architectural style,” so the data showing in this comparison may change in the future.

Knowledge Graph Filters

Also announced today is a Knowledge Graph filter that’s evident on searches like “impressionist painters.” The filter sits in the upper right above the result carousel and lets the searcher switch to similar results for other types of artists.

More Updates Coming Soon

Google also previewed some changes that are on the way:

A new “more unified design” for Google search on mobile devices that’s “optimized for touch” with search results “clustered on cards.”
Updated iOS search apps that support cross-device notifications. You can speak a reminder on your Nexus tablet and it’ll show up later on your iPhone, for example.

For more on the Knowledge Graph and other changes mentioned above, see Google’s blog post. And for more from the media event today, see our FAQ about the Google Hummingbird search algorithm and Danny Sullivan’s live blog coverage.

About The Author

Matt McGee

Matt McGee joined Third Door Media as a writer/reporter/editor in September 2008. He served as Editor-In-Chief from January 2013 until his departure in July 2017. He can be found on Twitter at @MattMcGee.