New year, new Google! Search giant’s mobile platform gets a ‘bubblier’ makeover with an edge-to-edge design and rounder elements
- Color is used ‘more intentionally’ to highlight information without distraction
- Text gets bolder and bigger, with more Google fonts used everywhere
- The results fill the screen with an edge-to-edge design that minimizes shadows
- The new design will be rolled out in the coming days, the company says
Google takes the motto ‘New Year, New Me’ to heart with a redesign of the Google mobile site for Android and iOS, designed to simplify the look and feel of the results.
In an announcement Friday, the search engine giant said the new design will feel ‘a bit more vibrant and resilient’ and lean into ‘that’ Googley ‘feel.
Color is used ‘intentionally’ to highlight important information without distraction.
Text gets bolder and bigger, with more Google fonts used everywhere.
And those results fill more of your phone’s screen, with an edge-to-edge design that minimizes shadows.
The redesign will be rolled out in the coming days, the company said.
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In an announcement Friday, Google said the new design will feel “ a bit more vibrant and more resilient. ” Color will be used sparingly so that important information can be emphasized without distraction.
“Rethinking visual design for something like Search is really complex,” Google designer Aileen Cheng said in a blog post.
This is especially true given the enormous development of Google Search. We not only organize the information on the Internet, but all information around the world. ‘
The team’s goal was to simplify the screen, not crowd the screen or complicate the search experience.
“We want to make the search results shine so people can focus on the information rather than the design elements that surround it,” she added.
Text in the new Google search engine design is getting bigger and more powerful, and more Google fonts are used everywhere.
Cheng calls the new look ‘a relief!’
Text will be easier to read, with more powerful fonts and larger text for results and section titles, and more of Google’s own font will be included.
“It was also important to bring consistency to when and how we use fonts in Google Search, as it also helps people analyze information more efficiently,” said Cheng.
Previous iterations of the redesign experimented with both bold colors and muted tones, she said.
Ultimately, the design team decided to center content and images against a clean, white background with no shadows.
Not only did she draw attention to the relevant information, but she also said, “It feels optimistic, too.”
The designers used the curve of the Google name and logo as a starting point, rounded off the edges of the knowledge panels and one side of an image or video carousel.
Google designer Alexa Cheng says the team was inspired by the roundness of the Google logo, calling it ‘part of our DNA’
‘That shape is already so well in our DNA. Just look at the search bar or the magnifying glass, ”said Cheng.
It was in January 2020 that Google made one of the biggest changes in the way search results are displayed, removing color overlays and using ‘favicons’, small brand icons, to identify organic hits.
The resulting design made it much more difficult to distinguish between organic results and ads.
After almost universal outrage, the company went back to the drawing board.
“Although early tests for desktop were positive, we always include feedback from our users,” Google said at the time.