Google introduces a “Continuous Scrolling” feature on desktop so users don’t have to navigate between pages to find the relevant search results for US English-language searches, extending a feature the company has offered on mobile for some time.
In particular, users should not confuse continuous scrolling with infinite scrolling. Continuous scrolling allows users to see up to six pages of search results by scrolling down before seeing the “More” button to search for more results. On mobile, Google limits continuous scrolling to four pages of search results at one time.
Google has traditionally taken a ‘paged’ approach to search results. That means that until now, when users scrolled down the search results page and wanted to see more results, they had to click the page number at the bottom.
The new feature can also provide more visibility to sites that didn’t rank high enough to be on the first page. People tend not to go to the second page and very few brave souls go to pages after that – hence the joke: the best place to hide something criminally harmful is page 2 of Google’s search results.
The change comes at a time when many users are complaining about Google’s search results deteriorated in quality. In response, Google made a series of changes, including making search results more visual. In September, it also rolled out a feature that brought up results from Reddit and Quora under a section called “Discussions and Forums”.
While many features have a mobile-first design, Google is also working to improve desktop search. The company is testing widget style maps on the home screen to give users at-a-glance access to information such as weather and stocks.
