In the technology-driven milieu of the twenty-first century, Google’s role in our lives has evolved: what was once merely a useful asset has unequivocally become an integral part of our lives.

We rely on Google for our sense of direction (literally), for instant exposure to media and current news, and for convenient access to an array of educational tools. In short, Google has become our favourite portal to the rest of the world.

But our ability to take advantage of the venerable search-engine has heretofore often been compromised by the volatility of our connectivity, particularly in an African context.

Data is extraordinarily expensive in South Africa in particular, in relation to the rest of the world as a whole – and the different capabilities of different phones, as well as the various contingencies of storage space have sometimes impeded our recourse to the search engine.

Google Go, recently launched by the technology giant, has been designed to try improve on these problems. The newly-developed app takes up less than 5 MB of space on your phone, and uses a moderate quantity of data to the greatest possible advantage. Essentially, the Google Go app will provide an interface that is likely to make our connection to Google stronger than ever, which is happy news for anyone who consumes vast volumes of data to find out the weather, or who would prefer to follow critical political events blow-by-blow.

The app is available now in 26 African countries, can be purchased via the Google Play Store, and will come pre-installed on all Android Oreo (Go) devices.