Google Trends Releases New Features to View and Export Search Data

Google Trends is a tool based on Google Search that shows how frequent a specific search-term is entered in correlation to the total search-volume across various areas of the world, and in different languages. Earlier this month, Google Trends launched a new interface, along with several new features to improve the functionality of the Explore tool, as well as the overall appearance of the website.

Google Trends Updates:

Features Added to Google Trends Explore Tool

Updated interface: Navigation is made easier and simpler with single screen viewing of data
Historical data by day: Archived trend data is now able to be viewed for a specific day. Previously, only a month view was available. Users are now able to customize the archive range for specific dates when known events are happening, including news, sales, and product launches.
Geographic comparison: When two or more search terms are compared a map will be included to show which terms are stronger by sub region.
Search term filtering: Users are now able to individually filter by geographic area and time when comparing two or more search terms
Export to Excel: All data components in the trend interface are now able to be exported to an Excel CSV file
Mobile embed update: Mobile versions of charts for imbedding purposes is also available

Features Removed from Google Trends Explore Tool

News and Forecast buttons: “Notable” news stories from a user’s trend line are no longer able to be viewed, and users are not able forecast future search interest as well
Trending over time (MAP): Users are no longer able to view the geographic search interest changes over time.

Unchanged Features on Google Trends

Trend results: The actual data from Google Trends appears to remain unchanged.
Individual search term details: Users are still able to look at geographic search term performance, along with the rising or top related search queries
Share and embed: Results are still able to be shared on social media, and charts are able to be embedded on HTML pages.

Overall, the Google Trends update appears to have made the tool more visually appealing to users. However, by adding features to the Explore tool to improve functionality, along with removing unused features, Google Trends will most likely benefit in the long run.