Google Images Introduces New Search Results With “Infinite Scroll”

Google Images is what you use to, obviously, search for images. Yesterday, Google updated the interface. Several big changes were made, including the elimination of by-page listings in favor of what’s known as “Infinite Scroll”.

What is Infinite Scroll? It’s when you reach the bottom of any page of results and are presented with a “More” link instead of page 1, 2, 3 and so on. This method of page results is not limited to Google Images. Bing image search, Twitter and Facebook also all do it.

Personally, I can’t stand this way of browsing for three reasons:

1. Crash-happy

What Infinite Scroll does is instead of loading short-and-small page-by-page listings, it keeps adding data to the existing web page. Load up enough content and your browser will crash.

2. Where am I?

When sifting through content you have no frame of reference to speak of. Let’s say you load up the equivalent of 5 pages of images in Google Images. There’s no going back to page 3 because there is none. It’s one big long honkin’ list.

3. A PC is not a f***ing phone.

“More” links on smartphone devices do make sense because of the limited screen resolution, but not on a PC. I like having pages I can click back and forth between because it’s easier to know where you are.

What do you think of the new Google Image “Infinite Scroll”?

Maybe I’m wrong and maybe Google’s new way of getting image search results is better. Or maybe I’m right and it just plain sucks.

What do you think?

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http://aaronfournier.50webs.com/ Aaron Fournier
Infinite scroll sounds nice and convenient at first, but I prefer having pages instead due to the first two reasons you stated above.

http://menga.net Rich Menga
I have a 4th reason now after looking at it again: The first page of results before the “Show More Results” button is ridiculously long. Scroll, scroll, scroll, scroll, scroll.. By the time you get to the “More” button your scroll finger is cramped up.
Oh, and a correction: There is in fact “pages”, but it's small text you have to watch for as you're scrolling and you still have to make a mental note of where you are when going through that massive list.

http://vertimyst.myopenid.com/ Vertimyst
Actually, I think this design is a great improvement – because the result pages continue as you scroll, it's faster to find what you're looking for. Usually (at least for me) you find what you want within the first 5 pages or so, and Google Images displays up to 16 pages before the 'More' button. (And if you really wanted to click the More button, you could just hit the 'End' key on your keyboard)

http://davidrisley.com David Risley
You might not be suprised, but I disagree. Yeah, I know. Call Guiness.
This is an *image* search, and the new results focus on just that – images. The prior interface wasted a lot of space plus it had stuff on the screen which was not related to what the person wants – images. It is super easy to scroll through. There are still page numbers in there, as headers. So, I think its a nice improvement. Reduces clicks tremendously.
You can always switch to the basic version again. The option is at the bottom of the screen.

http://menga.net Rich Menga
Good find on the “Basic” link, glad it's there.

lespaul20
I disagree too.
I don't think your first point is as certain as you make it to be.
You've corrected your second point. Who would use the wheel to scroll through that big of a list? There is a scroll bar.
David addressed you last post. Much more info per page view.
Rich, I don't know where you are coming from.

http://menga.net Rich Menga
It would appear that you can only click “Show More Results” once or twice at most using the new interface. It wasn't this way a few days ago. For example, if you search for “test”, Google Images says there are 321M results, however it halts after 42 pages' worth (which is nowhere near 321M). This is most likely to avoid crashing browsers. But it also completely denies you from seeing all the results.

lespaul20
I did notice that it wont show you all the results. However, I'd try a different search before I'd click through 42 pages worth of images. With the changes they have made since you wrote this article I'd say it's much better than the old way of displaying image results.