Google Image Search just got amazing (by copying Bing)

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Thrilled to see that Google Image Search has got a such a beautiful makeover. As of today, it has stripped out the unecessary text, made the search results much more visual and provided lots more of them. A nice little extra is when you click on the image, it displays super clearly as a box superimposed on its orginal website. Basically, it has copied a lot from rival search engine Bing which up till now had the best image search on the internet. Now? Well I’m tempted to say Google has just won the prize back…

The Changes:

1) Text is stripped away to make pictures stand out more

2) Instead of having to scroll to page 2 to see the second set of ten results, the page is now infinitely scrollable, with page breaks marked above sets of pictures.

3) Hover over an image to get the text details: size, url and an idea of what shape/size it is.

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4) Individual pictures are displayed super clearly on top of the original website page, making it easier to copy them, save them or just view them better.

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Result: Great for bloggers, and probably an admission from google that image blogs are taking over the world.

Anna Leach

11 comments

  • Oh gods, this is complete crap. It essentially crashers my browser. It will take forever to load the first page of images, then – without me scrolling – it will proceed to load the next few thousand images. I will never use google for image searches again, which is unfortunate, because it was once a fantastic resource.

  • This is a step in the right direction. Google is gonna reap its benefits in the long run.

  • How do I get rid of it? It’s slow (and I have a speedy enough computer and connection), has less information available at a glance (file size, pixels, site address), a pain in the arse to middle click multiple thumbnails to open in new windows (you have to wait until you hover over the image so it expands before it can be middle clicked) and when you click an image from the results page you have to close the image before you can see the rest of the page that’s opened up in the background and this action is delayed, as well as it taking even longer to reload the page. The only benefit is more results pages but I’d rather specify the number in the old image search. I actually went to google.com by mistake a day or two ago and saw it then and thought to myself “thank god they’re not doing it for the UK” but today, what do I find? >_> So really, how do I turn this abomination off? Bloody Bing. >_<

  • Why is Google copying Bing all the time? First the ‘image of the day’ page, the Image Search makeover AND NOW, the Local search result category for mobile devices:-

    When you search for say ‘italian food’ in Bing on Windows Phone 7, you get a separate result category, named LOCAL, that lists italian restaurants/cafes etc within your locality, giving info such as addresses, phone number and directions/maps.

    Now Google have copied this aswell!!! It’s like they’re running scared of Bing.

  • I’m afraid I don’t like the new changes. The text information that has been stripped away was really useful, particularly the pixel dimensions. Rather than glancing over the images to find the right one, I now have the extra step of hovering over the image.
    Luckily this set up can be changed back by scrolling to the bottom of the page and selecting ‘Switch to basic version’. But does anyone know how to change the really annoying next page, changes 4 in the above article? Maybe I’ll use altavista whilst I wait for the error to be corrected.

  • It’s as slow as a drunk geriatric snail on my PC. Looks to me like they’ve over done the swanky AJAX code which is fine if you have a super high-tech machine and city-speed broadband.

    To me it’s thumbnail image overload. It’s hard to use in my opinion. I’m already sick of having to hover over images to see more information.

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