Visual search suggestions

August 14, 2008 | By Heidi Adkisson

Most designers are likely familiar with functionality that dynamically displays search results suggestions as you type - for example, Google Suggests, which is shown below.

Google_suggests

The Apple Store takes this idea one step further by automatically displaying images as part of the results display. For example, here are the results suggestion when I’ve typed "ip":

Apple_visual_search

 

And here are the suggestions when I’ve typed "iph":

Apple_visual_search2

There is some seemingly promotional content in the results, but the top few choices are relevant. In some ways, this feels more like small dynamic web page built from the letters you’ve typed into search.