Google instant search is a classic part of the Google experience. We've all had our fun typing in half of a sentence and seeing how Google results fill it out. But for some, the Google instant search feature isn't any help at all.

What is Google Instant search? It's an integral part of Google that autocompletes or suggests the searches or URL's as you type. To make the predictions as relevant as possible, cookies and cache data from your previous searches are analyzed and used.

Some reasons people turn it off is that it may be distracting, or they prefer to manually enter what they want to search for. Others complain that the results are generally unrelated to what they want to search for.

Instant search works directly from google.com and in the URL bar on Google Chrome. To turn it off in Google Chrome, click the menu on the top right corner that's marked with three vertical dots. From there, under People (or You and Google if you're signed in with your Gmail account), click on Sync and Google services. Under the heading Other Google Services, turn off the following via the toggle on the right-hand side:

Autocomplete searches and URLs
Make searches and browsing better

After that, restart Chrome. If you're logged in with a Gmail account, the settings should remain the same each time you log in on a different device.

On Mozilla Firefox, it's surprisingly even simpler to turn off search suggestions. Visit this page: about:preferences#search, and then under the heading Default Search Engine, uncheck the box that reads Provide Search Suggestions. Then restart Firefox and the search suggestions will be absent next time you go to type in a search.

Lastly on Microsoft Edge (the new Internet Explorer), look for the menu in the top right corner represented by three dots. Click on Settings, then on Privacy and Security. Under the Privacy header, toggle the suggestion that reads Show search and site suggestions as I type, and Show search history. These will both disable search suggestions and remove any suggestions based directly on your search history.