South Africans should say goodbye to Google.co.za

Google has announced that it is starting to redirect people who use its country-specific domains, such as Google.co.za, to its main Google.com portal.

Google said the change would be rolling out gradually over several months. It did not say when specific domains would begin redirecting.

“Historically, as a part of our process to provide localised results, we’ve used country code top-level domain names (ccTLD), such as google.ng for Nigeria or google.com.br for Brazil,” the company announced.

“When you’re searching on Google, we aim to provide the most useful information, and many times that includes providing locally relevant search results.”

However, Google said its ability to provide a local experience has improved over the years.

Google explained that, in 2017,  it began providing the same experience with local results for everyone using Search, whether they were using google.com or their country’s ccTLD.

“Because of this improvement, country-level domains are no longer necessary. So we’ll begin redirecting traffic from these ccTLDs to google.com to streamline people’s experience on Search,” it said.

“This change will be rolled out gradually over the coming months, and you may be prompted to re-enter some of your Search preferences in the process.”

Google said it was important to note that although this update would change what people see in their browser address bar, it won’t affect how Search works.

Without noting specific legislation like Europe’s GDPR and South Africa’s POPIA, the company also assured it would not change how it handles its obligations under national laws.