The Microsoft has updated the mobile version of its Bing search engine for iOS devices, which means the Apple users would now be able to search for the right apps for their needs. Searching for the right apps has always been a problem for the smartphone generation, and the Bing App for iOS users intends to do just that. There are close to 500,000 apps in the App Store now, therefore it’s easy for the right apps to get lost in the crowd.
The announcement was made by Microsoft in a blog post. The users will either be able to search by the name of app or by category such as news apps or top iPhone apps.
The blog post says, “Auto app discovery is a unique feature created by Bing. The Bing search engine will surface apps in the context of normal web queries. For example, Thor 3D, Facebook and Hotels in Seattle are some of the queries for which Bing automatically finds the right apps.”
The Bing team also adds, “If an App is not installed on your phone, when you click on the download link Bing takes you to download the app from the iTunes App Store. If the App is already installed and the developer has enabled the launch functionality, then it will launch automatically.”
To check the apps, users need to go to m.bing.com in iPhone’s web Browser or they can alternatively download the Bing app for mobile. There two ways to search — one may be a general search term, which will include app search results as well, or the users can simply search for apps only.
Those developers, whose apps support the Bing functionality, can be launched from within the web app itself, and there are 50 such apps in the market now. Rest of the apps are expected to add this functionality with time.