How to Disable or Turn off Google Instant?

Google Instant is a new featured added to Google Search. It display search results as you type. The objective of this feature was to help the search engine users find the right content quickly. With Google Instant, search result page changes before your eyes and you don’t even have to hit the “Search” button. Most of the times relevant results and suggestion will appear before you finish typing. Google Instant saves time. There is no doubt. But sometimes you may find it annoying and want to disable Google Instant! Personally I don’t like it when I search the Internet for something important such as health related information. I hate to see all those unwanted search result pages appear when I type. So, I disabled Google Instant on my PC. Want to disable or Google Instant? Read on to know how to turn off or disable the Google Instant feature.

Disable or Turn off Google Instant:

Solution 1:

• Click options icon (near Sign in) on the top right corner of Google search page.
• Select Search settings from the drop-down menu.
• Google Global Preferences page will appear with several options.
• From Google Instant section, select Do not use Google Instant.
• Press the Save Preferences button.
• A confirmation window will appear saying that your preferences have been saved. Press OK button.
• Google Instant is gone for the session or for your Google account (when signed in).

Note: This solution is simple. But it is not permanent, if you don’t update your settings when you are logged in to your Google account. If you use this, you need to sign in to your account every time you perform a search. Otherwise your settings will be valid for a session only.

Solution 2:

• Type about:config in Firefox address bar and press enter.
• A warning message will appear. Simply ignore it and press the “I’ll be careful, I promise!” button.
• In the Filter filed type useragent. Some results will appear.
• Right click above general.useragent.extra.firefox and select Modify from the context menu.
• Enter string value window will appear. Type Firefox/1.0.0 or anything of your choice (such as Brower or Google) there.
• Press OK and exit your Firefox window.
• Now open Firefox again and try Google search. Google Instant is gone.
• For help, take a look at the screenshot above.

Note: This solution is permanent (if Google don’t change anything). Unlike the first solution, you don’t have to stay logged in. It will work for all users on your computer. But modifying the useragent value may confuse you later in some cases. For example, if you want to install a new Firefox add-on, most probably you’ll be told that your browser is not supported. This is normal. So, if you use this solution don’t forget to reset the value for preference general.useragent.extra.firefox before trying to install any add-on.

TG