Google Removes The + Search Command
Google has quietly removed one of the older search operators, the + search operator. Now if you try adding a + sign in your query, Google will ignore it. — Why did Google remove the old search operator? Kelly from Google said in a forum thread …
Context & Ripple Effects
Google has quietly retired one of search's oldest query operators: a Google staffer named Kelly confirmed in a forum thread that plus signs in queries are now simply ignored. It echoes an earlier precedent, when Google stopped deep-linking to Yahoo and MapQuest maps in 2007 — another long-standing search behavior withdrawn with little ceremony.
The removal lands just days after Google's October 22 search change, which the company framed as protecting user search privacy even as reporting at the time said it deliberately left a pay-to-play loophole letting paying parties access that same data. Against that backdrop, another unilateral tweak to how queries behave draws more scrutiny than a single operator would normally merit.
First-order effects
- Power users who relied on the + sign to force a term into results lose that control immediately — any query containing a + now executes as if the character were never typed.
Second-order effects
- Webmasters and search practitioners have to rework documented query habits toward quoted phrases and remaining operators, with Google's own forum threads serving as the de facto changelog for syntax changes.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, search operators function as revocable conveniences rather than stable syntax — power-search behavior migrates toward whatever Google currently documents, and away from techniques built up over a decade.
The trend: Google is steadily pruning legacy desktop-era search affordances when they conflict with its own priorities, treating query syntax as a mutable interface rather than a contract with users.