A ‘disruption in discovery’: What Google and Instagram’s new search partnership means for brands

14 Jul 2025

Your Google results are about to look more like your social feeds. On Friday, the internet giant began indexing Instagram content. That means Instagram posts from business and creator Instagram accounts will now appear in Google results.

With the new feature, Google is keeping apace with younger internet users who are increasingly turning to social media platforms as their search engines. A 2024 survey from Forbes Advisor and Talker Research found that Gen Z is 25% less likely than Gen X to use Google for searches. The survey also found that 46% of Gen Z and 35% of millennials prefer social media to traditional search engines. Google did not return Glossy’s request for comment.

“We are absolutely witnessing the biggest disruption in discovery and search behavior, since the introduction of Google, that brands have ever seen,” said Leslie Ann Hall, CEO and founder of e-commerce agency Iced Media. “Google and Instagram, who are not the most common partners, are now getting together in this fight for relevance where we’re seeing TikTok, ChatGPT, Reddit and Amazon really starting to dominate the search landscape.”