London: Internet giant Google's "search" will now not only hunt down typed-in words but also answer questions like an encyclopaedia.

In a drastic makeover for the search engine, the option will no longer show only a list of blue links to varous websites, but will also be dotted with information that would answer people's questions, the Daily Mail reported. The new version of search will use what is called "semantic search" that attempts to understand the meaning of searches, rather than simply hunting for words.

Microsoft has a similar option with its Bing search engine, the second most-popular in the US. Google has "quietly" amassed information on 200 million items including people, places and products. The daily said that in 2010, Google acquired a database company called FreeBase, and expanded its storehouse from 12 million to 200 million today.

Amit Singhal, a senior vice president at the company, said most searches rely on other sites -- and not Google itself -- to provide an answer. "We cross our fingers and hope there's a web page out there with the answer," he said. The changes, however, was an ongoing process that could take years, he said.