Newsletter
The Google News update that brings the service in line with the Alphabet-owned company’s Material Design guidelines started being rolled out to the browser version of the platform earlier this week and should be available on a global level by now. Originally announced at the last iteration of the annual Google I/O developer conference earlier this month, the update already made its way to Android and iOS devices, with the firm now standardizing its news aggregator across all supported platforms.
The new version of Google News for browsers is virtually identical to the company’s mobile apps, with the revamp also debuting magazines which can be accessed from the Favorites and Saved Searches tabs on the left sidebar. Neither saved stories nor queries are now showing up as part of the top overflow menu either, presumably as Google was looking to avoid redundancy. The Google News mobile update was delivered in the form of a new version of the Google Play Newsstand app which got rebranded earlier this week, in addition to receiving support for a wide variety of artificial intelligence technologies meant to predict which stories are likely to pique your interest based on your known preferences and reading history. The browser build of the service has access to the same solutions and is meant to deliver a more organic reading experience which requires fewer manual searches.
Google has been infusing AI and Material Design into all of its products in recent times and is expected to continue doing so going forward, in line with the “AI first” strategy outlined by Chief Executive Officer Sundar Pichai last year. Gmail also received a similar revamp earlier this spring, though the new additions to Google News are arguably more complex as they’re also seeking to support subscription-based business models of select media organizations through the aforementioned Magazines tab.
