Sarah Perez (Hacker News):

The era of the “ten blue links” is officially over.

At its Google I/O conference on Tuesday, Google unveiled an AI-powered overhaul of Search centered around a reimagined “intelligent search box” — what the company describes as the biggest change to this entry point to the web since the search box debuted more than 25 years ago.

Instead of returning a simple list of links, Google Search will drop users into AI-powered interactive experiences at times. Google is also introducing tools that can dispatch “information agents” to gather information on a user’s behalf, along with tools that let users build personalized mini apps tailored to their needs.

[…]

While Google says that AI Mode is not the default experience, Search’s user interface encourages users to ask follow-up questions instead of scrolling down to the links to other pages.

John Gruber:

Odd, to me, to paint this only in terms of user convenience (ostensible user convenience at that), and not in terms of this being a de facto attack on Zillow and the rest of the web.

Nilay Patel (2024):

There’s a theory I’ve had for a long time that I’ve been calling “Google Zero” — my name for that moment when Google Search simply stops sending traffic outside of its search engine to third-party websites.

Amanda Silberling (Hacker News):

On Google’s video announcing the Search updates, one commenter wrote, “this is the best advertisement for letting people know it’s time to get a different search engine.”

[…]

If you’re curious about alternative search engines, you’re in the right place. Here are some places to start (or, embrace chaos and see where Open Web Engine takes you).

Previously:

• Google’s AI Search and “Web” View

Update (2026-05-27): Jess Kinghorn (Hacker News):

DuckDuckGo has been one major winner of this Google Search abandonment. Just for a start, visits to its AI-free search page noai.duckduckgo.com between May 20 to May 25 are said to have increased by 22.7% on average week-on-week, with the figures peaking May 24 at 27.7%.

The DuckDuckGo mobile app saw installs spike in the US by 18.1% on average compared to the previous week. TechCrunch reported this growth was sustained over six days, peaking at 30.5% on May 25.

Artificial Intelligence Google Gemini/Bard Google Search Web

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