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Google announced yesterday a new feature they are "beta testing" to allow searchers to filter their web searches by dates (something they had for a while but dropped from mobile - it is on desktop). So they announced a new before: and after: search operator that lets you do this. Then quietly noted that they discontinued the sort by date feature in search.
Here is the announcement:
For many searches, surfacing fresh information often ensures the best relevancy. However, sometimes people want to find older yet also relevant information. Our tools have long made this possible. Now we’re testing new before: and after: commands to make this even easier....
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) April 9, 2019
When I saw that tweet, I kept refreshing to see when Google would say they dropped the sort by date option. 13 tweets into the thread, Google posted about that feature being retired:
Within news search, sort-by-date is very useful. That’s because we often have good confidence about the dates associated with stories. Sort-by-date works there because the dates are meaningful and valid.... pic.twitter.com/GizY7zfNpO
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) April 9, 2019
Here is what it looked like:
I honestly thought Google added this search operator quickly (I can be wrong) because they dropped the tools to do it within the interface. Google keeps removing more and more search operators, I am surprised they took the time to add a new one?
But Danny's tweet made it sound like this was something Google has been working on for some time - so I guess I was wrong to assume that:
Super proud of the Googlers who helped get the new before: & after: date filtering commands launched in beta testing today. You'll find these most useful when doing news search, because that's where we have the most confidence in dates associated with documents. https://t.co/Xcu4GPvKeG
— Danny Sullivan (@dannysullivan) April 9, 2019
We’ve been developing these new commands over the past year and are excited to share them for beta testing now. But we’re looking at some further possible improvements before we finalize them, in particular with date display....
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) April 9, 2019
Google said they don't plan on removing the date picker from desktop search:
There are no plans for that to happen. These are just new ways to do the same more easily.
— Danny Sullivan (@dannysullivan) April 10, 2019
New before: and after: command
So how does this new before: and after: command work? Danny did an awesome job explaining it on Twitter. It works like any other search operator, like the site: command. You enter your query, then specify the before: and/or after: with the date syntax after the :.
The before: & after: commands return documents before & after a date. You must provide year-month-day dates or only a year. You can combine both. For example:
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) April 9, 2019
[avengers endgame before:2019]
[avengers endgame after:2019-04-01]
[avengers endgame after:2019-03-01 before:2019-03-05] pic.twitter.com/bo1rSeulbH
Power user tricks:
More power user notes! You can use either dashes or slashes in dates. Both of these are valid:
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) April 9, 2019
2018-12-31
2018/12/31
You can also use a single digit for month or day, so all of these are valid:
2019-3-1
2019-3-12
2019-03-01
The exception is for news searching. When searching using before: and after: and using the News tab, you should always see dates displayed. This is because our systems always see it relevant to show news dates & we have more confidence in those dates....
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) April 9, 2019
Google then talks about how Google has issues sometimes picking up the right dates for stories, something they've discussed previously.
This leads to another power user note about dates. It can be difficult for us to know the exact date of a document for a variety of reasons. There’s no standard way that all site owners use to indicate a publishing or republishing date....
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) April 9, 2019
We make the best estimates we can on dates, but with our existing tools or our new commands, you might find dates that are incorrect or imprecise. You can learn more about how we estimate dates here, along with advice for site owners: https://t.co/IrxCTtbwQT
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) April 9, 2019
Yes, you can let Google know about issues:
I'll pass this on but it might be a time zone thing where some docs are within the time period as we calculate for search versus where a user is.
— Danny Sullivan (@dannysullivan) April 10, 2019
Here is where to give feedback:
We hope you enjoy testing the new before: and after: commands. We’ll be watching for feedback, including within our Google Search forum. We look forward to finalizing it for formal release. https://t.co/2Rh4cLVMiG
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) April 9, 2019
Forum discussion at Twitter.
