Google Search introduces a new way to doomscroll

Google has now launched a ‘continuous scrolling’ feature on the desktop. This will spare users the hassle of going through multiple pages to get to the suitable search result. Google tweeted, “Starting today, we’re bringing continuous scrolling to desktop in English in the US, so, you can continue to see more search results easily. When you reach the bottom of a search results page, you'll now be able to see up to six pages of results.” With this announcement, Google moves away from its traditional paginated approach to search results. 

In October 2021, Google rolled out continuous scrolling for mobile for seamless browsing; the scrolling limit on these devices was set at four pages.

This announcement could be seen from the lens of growing criticism against Google Search for the relevancy of the results it throws up. Many complained that one would need to traverse through an ocean of insignificant and often sponsored/paid content to finally arrive at a result relevant to their query. To this end, Google has introduced improvements over the years. For example, at the Search On event held in September this year, Google’s team announced a range of features, such as introducing multisearch in Google Lens and blending translated text into background images.

Google Search seems to have found its rival in the newly introduced ChatGPT from OpenAI. Many feel that despite some of its flaws ChatGPT offers better results for a query than a Google search. Gmail inventor Paul Buchheit tweeted that Google was just ‘a year or two’ away from complete disruption. He added that AI would eventually eliminate the search engine result page. 

On December 6, Google announced a ChatGPT for Google browser extension. This extension will show responses from ChatGPT alongside that from Google Search results.