Google Trends: Understanding the data. - Google News Initiative (2024)

Lesson 11 of 13

Google Trends: Understanding the data.

Fundamentals

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Sourcing Google Trends data.

Google Trends analyses a sample of Google web searches to determine how many searches were done over a certain period of time.

For example, if you’re doing a story about the Zika virus and you want to see if there was a recent uptick in searches on the topic, selectPast 90 days. Trends analyses a sample of all searches for Zika virus within those parameters.

Reading the Interest Over Time graph.

When you search for a term on Trends, you’ll see a graph showing the term’s popularity over time in (nearly) real time. Hovering your mouse over the graph reveals a number, which reflects how many searches have been done for the particular term relative to the total number of searches done on Google.

Numbers on the graph don't represent absolute search volume numbers, because the data is normalised and presented on a scale from 0-100, where each point on the graph is divided by the highest point, or 100. The numbers next to the search terms at the top of the graph are sums, or totals.

A line trending downward means that a search term's relative popularity is decreasing—not necessarily that the total number of searches for that term is decreasing, but that its popularity compared to other searches is shrinking.

Finding the most searched topic in every region or country.

When you search for multiple terms on Trends, you’ll see a comparative map showing which term or topic is most searched in each region.

Step 1
Interest over time comparison.Let’s compare the search terms Zika virus and malaria. You’ll find that over time, malaria experiences a steady query rate while Zika was barely searched for until a huge spike in January 2016.

Step 2
Compared breakdown by subregion:The colour intensity of each region represents the percentage of searches of the leading search term in that region. This example shows that Zika virus was a more popular search term in the Americas while malaria was relatively more popular in Asia.

Rising data.

At the bottom of your results page, theRelated querieschart can show you the Top and Rising terms associated with any topic or trending story.

TheRisingtab represents terms that were searched for with the term you entered and had the most significant growth in volume over the selected time period. You’ll see a percentage of the Rising term’s growth compared to the previous time period. If you see “Breakout” instead of a percentage, it means that the search term grew by more than 5000%.

The percentages are based on the percent increase in search interest for the selected time frame. If you’re looking at the last 7 days, the benchmark for the rise in searches would be 7 days prior; if it was the last 30 days, the benchmark would be for the 30 days prior. The only exception is when viewing the full history (2004-Present), when the percentages are benchmarked at 2004.

Reading the Related searches chart.

Step 1
Click the dropdown to seeTop terms.

Step 2
This table shows terms that are most frequently searched with the term you entered, in the same search session, with the same chosen category, country or region. If you didn’t choose a search term (and just chose a category or region), overall searches are displayed.

Data that is excluded.

Trends excludes certain data from your searches:

Searches made by very few people:Trends only analyses data for popular terms, so search terms with low volume appear as 0 for a given time period.

Duplicate searches:Trends eliminates repeated searches from the same user over a short period of time for better overall accuracy.

Special characters:Trends filters out queries with apostrophes and other special characters.

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Google Trends: Understanding the data. - Google News Initiative (2024)

FAQs

How does Google Trends understand data? ›

What searches are included in Google Trends? Google Trends data reflects searches people make on Google every day, but it can also reflect irregular search activity, such as automated searches or queries that may be associated with attempts to spam our search results.

Learn More ›

How do I read Google Trends data? ›

The numbers next to the search terms at the top of the graph are sums, or totals. A line trending downward means that a search term's relative popularity is decreasing—not necessarily that the total number of searches for that term is decreasing, but that its popularity compared to other searches is shrinking.

Know More ›

How do I use Google Trends for news? ›

Finding stories with Trends Explore

From any page in the Trends Explore site, click the menu button in the top left and select Trending Searches. Trending Searches shows the top-searched news stories each day in your location. You can also see realtime search trends, showing the biggest spikes of the past 24 hours.

What is the difference between Google Trends and Google Insights? ›

Google Insights for Search was a service by Google similar to Google Trends, providing insights into the search terms people use in the Google search engine. Unlike Google Trends, Google Insights for Search provides a visual representation of regional interest on a country's map.

Where does Google Trends data come from? ›

We take a sample of the trillions of Google searches, because it would otherwise be too large to process quickly. By sampling our data, we can look at a dataset representative of all Google searches, while finding insights that can be processed within minutes of an event happening in the real world.

Read The Full Story ›

How accurate are Google Trends? ›

It was shown that Google Trends data can exhibit a high variability when queried at different points in time, indicating that it may not be reliable except for very frequent search terms due to sampling, and relying on this data for prediction is risky.

Explore More ›

What are the limitations of Google Trends? ›

One limitation of Google Trends is that it often provides data without context. When analyzing search results, it's unclear why a particular term is trending. This lack of context can lead to misinterpretations, mainly if you rely solely on Google Trends for insights.

View Details ›

How do I use Google News effectively? ›

Customize your For you & Following feed

To find the latest top stories, tap Headlines .
To read a story with various perspectives and context, tap Full coverage of this story .
To follow topics, sources, and locations, search for your interests. Then, tap Follow .

Learn More ›

Is there a better version of Google Trends? ›

If you've been relying on Google Trends, alternatives like Topic Research can give you a fresh perspective. This Semrush tool generates trending topics and popular headlines around a seed topic.

Show Me More ›

Is Google Trends part of Google Analytics? ›

By leveraging Google search analytics, including Google Trends and Google Search Console, you can optimize your ads to effectively target specific keywords and search terms. Google Trends is a valuable tool that provides insights into the popularity of search terms over time.

Tell Me More ›

Is Google Trends an SEO tool? ›

You can use Google Trends for SEO without having to search for a specific keyword. I'm talking about “Trending Searches”. This feature shows you real-time data for searches that have spiked over the last 24 hours.

Learn More Now ›

How does Google Trends score work? ›

Understanding the numbers

Indexing: Google Trends data is pulled from a random, unbiased sample of Google searches, which means we don't have exact numbers for any terms or topics. In order to give a value to terms, we index data from 1-100, where 100 is the maximum search interest for the time and location selected.

Read On ›

How do Google Trends categories work? ›

If you're using Trends to search for a word that has multiple meanings, you can filter your results to a certain category to get data for the right version of the word. For example, if you search for “jaguar,” you can add a category to indicate if you mean the animal or the car manufacturer.

Get More Info Here ›

How is interest measured with Google Trends Muckrack? ›

Muck Rack trends: Focuses specifically on news articles—not searches in general— resulting in a more detailed and relevant set of results. Shows how many articles mention a term over a set time period, while Google Trends instead measures terms on a scale of 1-100.