Google Search Is Going Multimodal
davidblack · x · 2026-07-15
This post recaps the history of Google Images, setting the stage for a multimodal future in search products. Key milestones along the timeline include: - 2001: Google Images was born because people wanted to find J.Lo's green dress - 2011: Search by Image allowed searching with pictures instead of keywords - 2018: Lens turned the phone camera into a search box - 2022: Multisearch combined images and text - 2024: Circle to Search let users search anything directly on the screen - 2025: Search's AI Mode integrated images, text, voice, and video - 2026: Expect new browsable homepages and in-search image generation capabilities The core message is that Google is pushing the "search what you see" concept toward a comprehensive multimodal search experience.