This is a place devoted to giving you deeper insight into the news, trends, people and technology behind Bing.
Windows 8 is here.
Starting today people all over the world* can experience Bing in a brand new way. We’ve completely reimagined search for Windows 8, including the Bing app for web and image search and the new Bing apps designed specifically for Travel, Weather, Maps, News, Finance and Sports.
To mark the occasion, we released a 360° degree panorama on the Bing homepage. Those of you who have Windows 8** can explore the homepage with touch - allowing you to zoom, pinch and swipe as you explore the image. And those of you who don’t have Windows 8 quite yet can check it out from any modern browser that is HTML5 capable, exploring the image with your mouse. To get all the latest features in the apps, click into the Windows Store app when you start up Windows 8 and update your apps.
Bing
Searching with the Bing app is fast and fluid, whether you use a touch device to tap and swipe or type and click with a keyboard and mouse. Finger-friendly results and images are front and center letting you quickly find what you’re looking for, so you can search less and do more. You can still rely on the same great Bing web experience in Internet Explorer 10, but we’ve optimized the Bing app to shine on Windows 8.
Maps
The Maps app makes it easy to find the places you’re looking for and helps you get there faster. Quickly pinpoint locations, get directions, see traffic conditions and more— all designed to be easily navigable with touch.
Weather
The Weather app offers a beautiful preview of current weather, helping you prepare for the latest conditions with hourly, daily and 10-day forecasts. To help plan when to do something, historical data is available to examine likely temperature, rain and snowfall for a given time period. Users can browse weather from around the world and create live tiles for tracking real time and daily predictions for a set of places of interest to them.
A new approach to media integration
The Bing media apps (Finance, News, Travel and Sports) combine the best of dedicated application features with a built-in newsstand of media partners specific to each app category. We are partnering with the top media brands worldwide to offer an unprecedented integrated experience. In the United States, we have integrated with media partners like ABC, AP, Bloomberg, CNBC, Fodor’s, Lonely Planet, Reuters and complete daily editions of the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times.
Users can easily move from application functions to drilling in on specific media partners without leaving the application experience.
Sports
The Sports app is your personal sports companion that helps you stay on top of the leagues, teams, and players that you care most about. Swipe through the app to get an overview of the top sports headlines, live scores, schedules, standings, extensive statistics and much more. We make it easy to personalize the experience, so you can track the teams and leagues you are most interested in.
In building these apps, we were excited to have the canvas of Windows 8 in which to work with. It is a perfect environment for rich media experiences and provides a great platform to showcase how touch can transform the user experience. In Bing, we believe in offering the best experience for users to complete tasks – by searching for or tapping to their intent with best of breed application experiences.
Brian MacDonald, Corporate Vice President, Online Service Division
(*Note: The Bing apps are now available in all supported Windows 8 markets and available in 107 languages. Not all features and content are available in all markets. ** The Bing panorama feature is currently available in Germany, Great Britain, Australia, Japan, France, Canada, China, Spain and the United States.)
That 360° degree panorama on the Bing homepage looks very cool! Just another reason to visit it every day.
Features very beautiful
Forward Bing
I notice IE9 doesn't count as a "modern browser that is HTML5 capable"
I've been using the Full retail version Of Windows 8 since 9 am CST.. and I was already sold when I tried the developers release of w8.. This is a great O/S and super easy to use.. I will get a 2nd Touchy screen just for the Start menu functions.. nothing too big, just 15" or so.. I really love the Store Apps.. Much more stable than the RC versions.. You can use Windows Shell to get back the old Start menu if you want.
Why is NCAA football not a topic in Bing Sports apps? I would like to add a favorite team.
Some pretty impressive improvements as far as I'm concerned for Windows phones. I'm seriously considering swapping over from Android once there's a nice line-up :) I understand Samsung is releasing a W8 phone soon, so I'm eager to test it!