Peeking at Googles New Search User Interface

by Clint Boulton

Google has tweaked its logo. Can you tell the difference between the old and new? No? The old logo, with the fat drop shadow and TM symbol, is being replaced by the cleaner option below.

Here’s the old familiar homepage people have been working with for years.

And the new homepage. Looks cleaner, right? We actually liked the fuller drop shadow, but oh, well. There’s no accounting for taste.

Here is what search results look like for the query “string theory” on the SERP (search engine results page). Note the button for search options pointed out at the top.

And here’s the new look. New content type options help users refine searches. The query “string theory” returns search refinement options such as Images, Videos and Books.

In the old search UI, a user clicked the “Show options” link that we circled a couple slides back to refine searches.

Now users click a content type, such as videos, to see this streamlined SERP.

“String theory” returned options for video, books and more. The SERP for “NFL draft” offers more current info, such as updates and tweets.

Similarly on the relevance front, a search for “big green egg” is tailored toward shopping results.

Google also now zeroes in on various time periods based on the immediacy of news events. The UI lets users refine searches to the last two days or to the latest news.

Google UI borrows from Google Squared by offering related concepts.

What Google did for its desktop search UI it ported to its mobile search.

These are the new (wedding cake shape) and old SERP footers.

Google tested several design prototypes before settling on the new UI.