How to enable the new Google+ design

Martin Brinkmann
Nov 18, 2015
Updated • Jan 4, 2018
Companies, Google
|
7

Google relaunched its social networking service Google+ on Tuesday by putting an emphasis on features that users of the service are interested in.

Google removed several features from Google+ in the recent past, the Photos application for instance which led to speculation that the company was about to give up on the project to establish a Facebook competitor.

That's however not the case apparently as Google decided to change the focus of Google+ instead.

The new Google+ puts "Communities and Collections front and center" according to Google as these are popular on the site.

Update: Google rolled out yet another design that changes things around. The method described below does not work anymore. You may switch back to the classic design currently by clicking on "back to classic Google+" in the lower left corner on Google Plus. This option will be removed eventually however according to Google.

classic google plus

The changes are rolled out gradually to all users of the service, as is the case with most updates of Google services and apps. Google+ users may see a beta test button on the website when they open it, and those who don't, can do the following to enable the new Google+ interface right away temporarily.

  1. Open the menu on Google+ and select Settings from it.
  2. Locate and click on "Manage Google+ Activity".
  3. Click on the search icon.
  4. Alternatively, open this page directly and run a search on it.

The new Google+ layout is activated when you do that, but it is not enabled permanently. While you can test the new features this way, you will need to go through the steps outlined above again in new sessions.

new google plus

The layout of the page has changed but what may weight more heavily is that some menu items seem to have been removed from the site completely.

The top menu, that enables you to filter your feed is gone for instance, and the main menu does not list hangouts, events and pages anymore.

A switch back is not really required right now as the change is only temporary, but you find it in the Settings as well:

  1. Load https://plus.google.com/u/0/settings directly to open the Google+ Settings.
  2. Locate "can't find the setting you are looking for? Try switching to classic G+" and click on the link.
  3. Or, click on this link directly: https://plus.google.com/u/0/settings?gmbpt=true&fd=1

The only feature that I'm using regularly on Google+ are pages, and they seem to have been removed or not yet implemented. While you can still click on a page to open it, it opens the activity log currently instead of the page's home.

You can still visit the Google+ page however but it is displayed in the old design, not the new currently. (via Caschy)

Now You: What's your take on the changes?

Summary
How to enable the new Google+ design
Article Name
How to enable the new Google+ design
Description
Find out how to sneak-peek the new Google+ design right now, and how to change back to classic Google+.
Author
Publisher
Ghacks Technology News
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Comments

  1. The Dark Lady said on July 9, 2023 at 11:19 am
    Reply

    Martin, I would appreciate that you do not censor this post, as it’s informative writing.

    Onur, there is a misleading statement “[…] GIFs are animated images …”. No, obviously you don’t seem to have take much notice of what you were told back in March regarding; Graphics Interchange Format (GIF).

    For example, https://www.ghacks.net/2023/03/31/whats-gif-explanation-and-how-to-use-it/#comment-4562919 (if you had read my replies within that thread, you might have learnt something useful). I even mentioned, “GIF intrinsically supports animated images (GIF89a)”.

    You linked to said article, [Related: …] within this article, but have somehow failed to take onboard what support you were given by several more knowledgeable people.

    If you used AI to help write this article, it has failed miserably.

  2. KeZa said on August 17, 2023 at 5:58 pm
    Reply

    AI is stupid, and it will not get any better if we really know how this all works. Prove me wrong.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IYl1sTIOHI

  3. Database failure said on August 18, 2023 at 5:21 pm
    Reply

    Martin, [#comment-4569908] is only meant to be in: [https://www.ghacks.net/2023/07/09/how-to-send-gifs-on-iphone-two-different-ways/]. Whereas it appears duplicated in several recent random low-quality non relevant articles.

    Obviously it [#comment-4569908] was posted: 9 July 2023. Long before this thread even existed… your database is falling over. Those comments are supposed to have unique ID values. It shouldn’t be possible to duplicate the post ID, if the database had referential integrity.

  4. Howard Pearce said on August 25, 2023 at 12:24 pm
    Reply

    Don’t tell me!

    Ghacks wants the state to step in for STATE-MANDATED associations to save jobs!!!

    Bring in the dictatorship!!!

    And screw Rreedom of Association – too radical for Ghacks maybe

  5. Howard Allan Pearce said on September 7, 2023 at 9:13 am
    Reply

    GateKeeper ?

    That’s called “appointing” businesses to do the state’s dirty work!!!!!

    But the article says itself that those appointed were not happy – implying they had not choice!!!!!!

  6. owl said on September 7, 2023 at 9:50 am
    Reply

    @The Dark Lady,
    @KeZa,
    @Database failure,
    @Howard Pearce,
    @Howard Allan Pearce,

    Note: I replaced the quoted URI scheme: https:// with “>>” and posted.

    The current ghacks.net is owned by “Softonic International S.A.” (sold by Martin in October 2019), and due to the fate of M&A, ghacks.net has changed in quality.
    >> ghacks.net/2023/09/02/microsoft-is-removing-wordpad-from-windows/#comment-4573130
    Many Authors of bloggers and advertisers certified by Softonic have joined the site, and the site is full of articles aimed at advertising and clickbait.
    >> ghacks.net/2023/08/31/in-windows-11-the-line-between-legitimate-and-adware-becomes-increasingly-blurred/#comment-4573117
    As it stands, except for articles by Martin Brinkmann, Mike Turcotte, and Ashwin, they are low quality, unhelpful, and even vicious. It is better not to read those articles.
    How to display only articles by a specific author:
    Added line to My filters in uBlock Origin: ghacks.net##.hentry,.home-posts,.home-category-post:not(:has-text(/Martin Brinkmann|Mike Turcotte|Ashwin/))
    >> ghacks.net/2023/09/01/windows-11-development-overview-of-the-august-2023-changes/#comment-4573033

    By the way, if you use an RSS reader, you can track exactly where your comments are (I’m an iPad user, so I use “Feedly Classic”, but for Windows I prefer the desktop app “RSS Guard”).
    RSS Guard: Feed reader which supports RSS/ATOM/JSON and many web-based feed services.
    >> github.com/martinrotter/rssguard#readme

  7. Anonymous said on September 14, 2023 at 6:41 pm
    Reply

    We all live in digital surveillance glass houses under scrutiny of evil people because of people like Musk. It’s only fair that he takes his turn.

  8. Anonymous said on September 18, 2023 at 1:31 pm
    Reply

    “Operating systems will be required to let the user choose the browser, virtual assistant and search engine of their choice. Microsoft cannot force users to use Bing or Edge. Apple will have to open up its iOS operating system to allow third-party app stores, aka allow sideloading of apps. Google, on the other hand, will need to provide users with the ability to uninstall preloaded apps (bloatware) from Android devices. Online services will need to allow users to unsubscribe from their platform easily. Gatekeepers need to provide interoperability with third-parties that offer similar services.”

    Wonderful ! Let’s hope they’ll comply with that law more than they are doing with the GDPR.

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