Google trend search feature neglects UK

Google has taken a significant step towards being able to offer real-time search facilities with a new feature in its search engine.

Surfers searching for popular terms will now be able to see statistics for that particular term, using information from Google Hot Trends.

"Now, when you search Google.com and your query matches one of the top 100 fastest-rising search terms, we'll show you a graph at the bottom of page, with more information - like how popular the query is, how fast it's rising over time, and other useful data," said Aaron Wise, associate product manager at Google.

It is no secret that Google covets Twitter's real-time search capabilities, with co-founder Larry Page recently telling engineers that he wanted Google to have a search index that updated every second.

Other real-time search engines including OneRiot and Scoopler focus their indexes on sites that are regularly updated such as news sites and blogs in order to be able to give up-to-the-minute information to searchers.

Google, on the other hand, indexes the vast majority of the web, meaning some parts of the index aren't updated for hours or even days at a time.

However, the tool is only available to surfers in the US and Japan for the moment, with no prospect of it coming to the UK in the near future.

A Google spokesman told Web User that there were no plans to implement the feature, or create a UK version of Hot Trends, any time soon. "We've got nothing to announce at this time on that front for the UK," the spokesman said.