You Can Now Search for Words in Your Images in Office 365

Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology has indeed come a long way. It made our apps and devices smarter than ever. And Microsoft is right on its heels as it recently rolled out a new powerful feature to Office 365 using this very same technology. Microsoft calls it Intelligent Search. Intelligent Search detects images and scans it for words or text. These words are then extracted and made searchable across Office 365, which includes OneDrive, SharePoint, Exchange, and more. Hence, you can now search for words in your images in Office 365 to quickly locate image files. This means that whenever a user uploads an image with text on it, the location data and text will be identified and extracted so it can become searchable.

Intelligent Search Makes You Work Smart

This new feature has numerous applications in practical life, both in the business and personal settings. For example, traveling employees can simply take pictures of their receipts and save them on OneDrive. Then, when the time comes that they have to submit their expense reports, they simply have to search for the images and information they need by searching for any image of receipts that contain relevant words, such as “coffee,” “flight,” or “hotel.”

With such a powerful interface and searching capabilities, this feature can be used practically for any purpose and by many people. In school, students can find relevant images to study about or help them learn. In the workplace, team members can easily work on a project and make workflow easier and faster with the help of Intelligent Search. Being on Office 365 makes it even more robust because that means images and search results can easily be shared with other people, pushing for more effective collaboration.

Instead of going over images folders and files, which can take a lot of time and energy, you can just type in the search box the text you remember about the image.

Search Any Image in Any Format

Intelligent Search detects, captures, and searchs any image in any format. It can search through a range of 21 file formats, such as jpg, png, bmp, gif, tiff, raw, arw, mrw, nef, nrw, orf, pef, rw1, sr2, and more. This way, you don’t have to do anything to make this feature work. No need to convert any files. Just upload them through OneDrive or SharePoint or within Office 365 and the images containing text are ready to be searched instantly.

The text from the image is what is searchable. However, only English is supported at the moment, with plans to include other languages in the future. For now, whenever you take an image of a business card or poster, you can search later on using the language or text that is exactly in the photo. However, in the future, Microsoft can translate the text in the image so you can search for it using any language, and vice versa. Actually, different languages are slated to be supported in the future. You can set your preferred language and the text in the images will be identified after translating your search keywords or key phrases.

Make Visual Content Search Faster, Easier, More Dynamic

Visual content is a rich form of data. It’s great for enhancing reports, emphasizing your points, or simply expressing your ideas. You can create mood boards with these images, conduct brainstorming, or just create a fantastic-looking presentation. And so, all that is great about visual content can now be optimized and harnessed by Intelligent Search.

Now, you don’t only search same or related content. You also don’t just search for images that reflect your keywords. You can also search your stored images with text or words that are within those images.

You can also easily share this powerful search feature and the search results you’ve come up with, because this feature is part and parcel of Office 365 now. You and your team or your audience or students don’t have to deal with guesswork or spending a lot of time going over hundreds, even thousands, of images looking for just one thing. You also don’t get overwhelmed with your images, because you know you can retrieve them quickly and without any hassle. They’re right at your fingertips, figuratively and literally, with the help of Intelligent Search.

The many benefits include less time on the computer so you can get back to what you’re doing. You may also be surprised that you are discovering new information which can help you with your tasks, especially since Intelligence Search works hand in hand with a personalized search feature that allows you to see the search results that are most relevant to you.