Each year, Google releases their Year in Search report. The report gives a fascinating glimpse into the search queries that dominated the year. Offering a look at both UK and global searches, it’s a great way to see what captured people’s attention and also use it to shape your future strategies. Instead of using data to highlight searches that are consistently popular, the report highlights emerging trends. Google does this by identifying queries that have shown an increase in search volume compared to the previous year.
As the world’s largest search engine, it’s not surprising to see that over 40,000 search queries were processed each second by Google. Roughly around 3.5 billion daily searches on average.
From sports, to politics and breaking news stories, no topic was off limits. We’re taking a closer look at the top searches of the year to see what piqued the curiosity of the nation and the globe.
UK searches were dominated by trending news events. These included the disappearances of Jay Slater and Michael Mosley, and the sad passing of Liam Payne. Along with the historic US Election and this summer’s Euros competition. These stories captured the attention of the nation and left us wanting to know more. But with so much information available on social media platforms, there can also be a sea of mis-information. Google’s report shows that the search engine is still seen as one of the most trustworthy sources of information on breaking news stories.
While UK trends were dominated by unfolding news stories, global trends differed slightly.
Politics still had a predominant place in search queries across the globe with users looking for the updates on the US election. Whereas major sporting events across football and cricket also accounted for top searches globally.
As technology advances, search habits are also evolving. People are looking for simpler ways to find information, turning to image, video and AI searches.
Over the past six years since its introduction, Google Lens gone onto become one of the search engine’s key features. Allowing users to search what they see, vision-based computing capabilities can analyse images and provide relevant search results. As people look for quicker ways to search, it’s clear to see the appeal and the results speak for themselves. Google Lens accounts for almost 20 billion monthly visual searches. Now one of Google’s fastest growing query types, younger demographics, in particular 18–24-year-olds are said to be engaging the most with Lens.
Google Lens also recently introduced video search capabilities offering even more ways to search. The technology allows users to capture a video and ask a question to see an AI generated overview and relevant search results.
In May 2024, Google introduced AI Overviews, which were then rolled out across UK searches three months later. The overviews use generative AI to produce a small snapshot of information and links to delve deeper. Google hopes that the overviews will streamline the search process and help users quickly find relevant information. According to The Digital Marketing Institute, Google AI Overviews are now used in over 20% of search results.
While this is great news for Google users, some people have raised concerns over the accuracy of these overviews. They also bring challenges for businesses who need to adapt their strategies to be featured in the overviews which appear before organic or paid listings.
With the year drawing to a close, you might be planning your search strategy for 2025 and beyond. To maximise results, it’s important to consider evolving search habits and factor these into your strategy. Discover our three key takeaways to connect with your audiences more effectively.
As Google starts to utilise AI, the way users interact with search listings could change. That’s why it’s so important to implement an effective SEO strategy and adapt to changing behaviour. If users can find the answer to their query in AI Overviews, zero-click searches could increase. However, Google says that initial data shows that AI Overviews lead to more clicks than traditional web listings.
It’s important to consider this in your strategy and optimise content to be included in AI Overviews. You can do this by:
With image and video searches on the rise, it’s also vital to prioritise optimising visual content within your strategy.
To help your business get noticed, the power lies in the hands of the data. These insights can help you identify trends and behaviour which can shape your strategy and in turn let you reap the rewards. By utilising data-driven insights, you can also stay one step ahead of your competitors and maximise opportunities.
As search trends continue to evolve, it’s important that your search strategy evolves along with them. Need support on your search strategy? Get in touch with our search team for further expert insights on 2025 search trends in our Future Trends Report.
