- What Graph Search Is – and How It Works
- Searching with Graph Search
- Fine-Tuning and Extending Your Searches
- Protecting Your Privacy from Graph Search
Like this article? We recommend
Like this article? We recommend
Like this article? We recommend
Searching with Graph Search
You access Graph Search from the new, bigger search box at the top of every Facebook page. (It’s labeled “Search for people, places, and things.”) To conduct a search, simply enter what you’re looking for into the search box.
Naturally, the more words you enter (that is, the more descriptive your query), the more refined the results will be. And remember, Graph Search is a natural language search, which means you can enter complete sentences. Instead of searching for Chinese restaurants, search for Chinese restaurants my friends like; instead of searching for class photos, search for photos of my classmates or photos of me and my classmates.
As you type your query, a list of suggestions appears beneath the search box. If one of the suggestions matches what you’re searching for, click it. If not, click See More at the bottom of the list to display more search options; then click the search option that best matches what you’re searching for.
)
Figure 2 Type your question and see Facebook’s suggestions.
The search suggestions that Graph Search displays when you start typing in the search box are just that – suggestions. If you search for favorite books, for example, you see suggestions for My favorite books, Books, Favorite books of various friends, Places named “favorite books,” and – when you click the More option – People, Pages, Places, Groups, and Apps having to do with “favorite books.” If you search for hotels in Seattle, you see several suggested place searches for just that.
What you see when you click one of these suggestions differs by the type of suggestion. For example, clicking the hotels in Seattle suggestion displays a page of Seattle hotels popular among Facebook users. Each hotel includes a star rating, brief description, and location, as well as how many people have checked in there and what other hotels those people also liked. You can click the hotel’s name to go to its Facebook page, click the Like button to like the hotel, or click the Map button to view a map of the hotel’s location.
)
Figure 3 The results of a Facebook Graph Search.
Other searches display more direct results. Say you searched for photos taken in California. Click this search suggestion and you see exactly what you searched for – photos taken in California by other Facebook users. Click any photo to view it larger in its own lightbox.