Google announces redesign of Search engine with more pictures and extra context about results

Google has announced a new redesign of its search tools, making it more visual and adding in extra contextual information about its results.

At its Search On event, the web giant also announced new features for Google Chrome and its Google Lens artificially-intelligent photo software.

The main aesthetic change are visually browsable results, “for searches where you need inspiration” such as “pour painting ideas”, Google says, which will surface a series of pictures at the top of search results without having to navigate to the Images tab.

It will also bring in more contextual information, rolled out over the coming months, with a new ‘Things to know” section that includes “different dimensions people typically search for”.

For those searching how to paint with acrylics, for example, underneath the top result will be a series of drop-down results that include a step-by-step guide, tips, or style options. Google will also have new “refine this search” and “broaden this search” options, so users can quickly move between different tiers of contextual information.

Google is adding more context to Search in other ways by expanding it’s ‘About This Results’ panel, which is accessible via the three-dot icon on the right-hand side of search results on desktop or mobile.

Currently this shows a description of a source – such as “The Independent”, or “from Wikipedia” – but Google will now be allowing sites to describe themselves “in [their] own words” as well. Users will also be able to see what others have said about a website, including “news, reviews, and other helpful background context”, which the company says will help users better evaluate sources.

Whether or not that proves true remains to be seen; Twitter introduced a similar system called Birdwatch where users can annotate incorrect tweets, although many users simply give opinion or mark baseless claims – such as voter fraud in the 2020 US election – as “not misleading”. The Independent has reached out to Google for more information about how such claims will be checked.

As well as Search, Google’s updates to Lens will let users search for information based on content in a photo – such as taking a picture of a pattern and asking Google for “socks with this pattern”, or a picture of a broken bike chain and asking Google “how to fix it”. Google’s machine learning will now recognise the contents of the image and search accordingly, using a technology it calls Multitask Unified Model (MUM) that can better understand context and comparisons.

MUM will also be used for video search results, identifying topics that might be related to video content even if it is not explicitly mentioned.

For iPhone and Android users, the Lens update will be available in the Google app that make all images on a page searchable through Lens. Google has an obvious advantage on its Android operating system but told The Independent that the Google app is opened three billion times per month; for context, there are one billion iPhone users, who open many apps multiple times per day.

A new Lens update is also coming to Chrome on the desktop in the coming months, where users “will be able to select images, video and text content on a website with Lens to quickly see search results in the same tab — without leaving the page you’re on”.

Finally, Google’s Shopping tab is getting more information about in-store items in local shops, with an “in stock” button to filter results. This is launching today in the UK, the US, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland.