Better late than never right? Despite still not being listed on Google’s App Store page, the update to Google Search app, the one containing voice search, is there. Simply click the “Get App” button on this page (within iTunes) and you’ll be able to get it (even if you have the previous version installed).
I’ve been testing it out the past few minutes. While finding tricky words like “parislemon” (the name of my personal blog) doesn’t exactly work (it looked for Paris, London — understandable), using a phrase like “where is sushi?” works beautifully. After a few seconds of processing, it returns results showing local sushi restaurants. Using the same interface as Google’s new iPhone-optimized search results pages, you can easily call the restaurants or get directions to them.
The function works for regular Google search results as well, not just local restaurants and the like. For example, say “Egypt” and you’ll get results for Egypt. I even tried “Who is buried in Grant’s tomb?” It worked.
This update also gives you one-touch access to all of Google popular apps like Gmail, Calendar, Readers and others. While clicking these buttons simply opens the web browser (not sure why Google didn’t put the web browser in the app itself like other apps do), it’s nice to have these all listed out.
Update: And there’s also a hidden menu.
Google Voice Search iPhone app from MG Siegler on Vimeo.
