Yahoo has launched a “suggest search” feature that automatically prompts users with suggested search queries as they type.

The feature is said by Yahoo to limit the number of words a user needs to type into a query. By presenting similar queries a user is supposed to have a shorter search time and get to what they’re looking for more quickly.

The feature is not entirely new; suggest search has previously been available to users of the Yahoo Firefox toolbar, although it is new to Yahoo.com. Notably at this stage the feature is not available on country specific Yahoo sites.

Yahoo previously launched a similar product, Instant Search, that prompted results in a similar way as suggest search prompts queries in September 2005, although that product never made it to Yahoo’s front page. Google offers an identical service to suggest search with Google Suggest.