Brave Search finally gets native Image and Video search capabilities

If you tried Brave Search in the past, you may have noticed that it redirected requests to find images or videos to either Google Search or Bing. Today, Brave Software announced the inclusion of video and image search capabilities in the search engine.

The major step forward for the search engine means that Brave users no longer have to use other search engines to find images or videos.

The new functionality works as expected. Brave Search may return image or video results when users search, and users may switch to the Images or Videos section on the search results page to filter results by these types.

Videos have a heavy focus on YouTube, but you also find links to other sites sparsely in the listings. Each video is listed with a thumbnail, title, playtime and, at least for YouTube videos, the number of views.

Note that videos can’t be played on Brave Search’s website, but load the hosting webpage instead; this is different from how Microsoft’s Bing Search handles videos, as these can be played directly on Bing.

As far as image search is concerned, it works as expected. A click on the images button opens a list of preview images that match the search phrase. Here, Brave engineers have implemented the ability to view the images on the Brave Search website. A click opens a larger version of the image on the Brave website.

Both search filters support the selection of a region and safe search, which is set to moderate by default. The image search option still contains the “search elsewhere” link to redirect the search to Google Search or Bing.

Brave Software notes that the image and video search capabilities of Brave Search are privacy preserving. The results do not rely on third-party data, as everything is handled natively by the company’s search engine.

Cutting ties with Bing Search, which up until recently powered about 7% of Brave Search searches, is an important milestone for Brave Software. The change cuts technical and other dependencies on third-party search engines, including that of censorship. When Bing censored results, Brave Search could not provide its users with the results.

The company plans to introduce additional capabilities to its video and image search options in the future, including support for advanced filters, such as license type or aspect ratio.

Closing Words

Integration of image and video search capabilities is an important milestone, as Brave Search users may now use the search engine for these searches as well. While some capabilities, like the aforementioned advanced filters, are missing currently, it allows them to rely solely on Brave Search for their searches now.

As far as improvements are concerned, video search would certainly benefit from additional sources and the ability to play videos directly on Brave’s website.

Now You: what is your preferred search engine, and why?

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