Google is one of the world’s most popular search engines, but it’s also notorious for killing its products. In fact, there’s a stand-alone website dedicated to tracking every product and service killed by the tech giant. The latest feature to be phased out is continuous scrolling in search results, just two years after it was introduced. According to a report, Google has announced that it will soon stop offering infinite scrolling when it comes to search results on mobile and desktop platforms, opting instead for a page-by-page search format.
No continuous scrolling in Google search results
Google first introduced continuous search results on mobile devices in 2021, and a year later it arrived on the desktop platform. However, it is now reportedly being discontinued. According to a report from Search Engine Land, the Mountain View-based tech giant is scrapping the feature and will instead prioritize a search format by page number.
A Google spokesperson reportedly said the feature will be phased out for desktop platforms starting today, while it will be returned to mobile devices “in the coming months.”
Instead of a continuous search, desktop users will reportedly now see page numbers followed by an a Following option below Gooooooooogle logo. On mobile devices, a More results it is speculated that an option will be introduced that will load the next search results page. According to the report, users should turn to the next page after every 10 or so search results.
The reason for that? Google reportedly said that automatically retrieving search results did not result in greater satisfaction with the search engine. “This change is to allow the search company to serve search results faster for more searches, instead of automatically loading results that users have not specifically requested,” the company added.
Google’s problems with artificial intelligence
Meanwhile, Google Search has been in the news for the past few weeks, but not for the right reasons. The search engine has introduced several artificial intelligence (AI) features to its platform, promising faster and better search results. However, one of the prominent features, known as AI Previews, started throwing up fake and somewhat bizarre information, some of which was based on questionable search results.
While Google claimed that AI Overviews only shows information “backed by the best web results”, the search tool’s error was attributed to the fact that it faced problems while filtering out satirical and nonsensical content. The feature has since been largely scaled back, with a report suggesting it only shows up for 15 percent of search queries.
