Google has announced a huge update to its popular Discover feed, allowing readers to customize their experience far more than before.
The Discover feed, which is primarily available on smartphones, combines user interests from searches with a social-style feed of articles that Google things will be of interest.
What’s happened?
Google has added a new ‘Follow’ button in Discover, enabling users to have more control over how they manage their experience.
- The feature allows users to start following specific creators, enabling things like social posts from Instagram and X or YouTube Shorts, to be added to the feeds
- Users will also be able to find publishers directly, allowing far more relevance to their Discover experience.
This is important because:
Google says this has happened because it’s had feedback from users that they’d like to see more creator content in their feeds, showing the search giant still sees this as an important product.
- It puts the Discover feed as a much closer competitor to X or Instagram feeds, blending search with social elements
- This follows the recent news that Google will allow you to more easily follow brands in Top Stories, as well as Google News
- It allows Google to offer a more engaged experience, and it can use this as a testbed for new AI experiences as well
Why should I care?
The main thing here is that it brings a new level of customization to your feed – I’ve been long frustrated at only being able to downvote things, rather than being able to add the things I care about.
- You’ll be able to tune your feed outside of your search interests more easily
- Algorithmic bias can be more easily tuned out, helping your find more engaging content
- For creators, it’s an important way to engage directly with an audience, which is critical as people look for more trusted sources as AI content increases
OK, what’s next?
Firstly, add Digital Trends as a preferred source in Google – when you see us in Discover, tap ‘Follow’ to make us a preferred source
- The follow button is available from now
- Social cards, such as Instagram and YouTube Shorts, are rolling out gradually, starting with select users on Android and iOS
- Integration with other Google services, like Search or News, might well follow as Google looks to make this a central social space for users
