The three-dots menu in Google Search next to results? It's a new feature!

Martin Brinkmann
Feb 3, 2021
Google, Search
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18

Google has started the rollout of a new Google Search feature yesterday for users in the United States. The change adds a three-dots menu to each site listed by Google Search in the results. A click on the menu displays an overlay with website information.

google three dots menu website information

The feature, labeled as Beta by Google, displays an excerpt of the site's article on Wikipedia, if an entry is available. Google is showing "additional context that may be available" for sites without a Wikipedia description. Right now, Google is displaying when the site was first indexed by the company's search engine.

The overlay shows whether the site uses HTTPS, and the full URL. Links to provide Google with feedback, open the privacy settings, a cached copy, and run a search to find out "how search works" are listed as well. Google users may click outside of the overlay area to return to the search results on the page.

Google features, e.g. Jobs or local business listings, a description that describes how Google sources the information is provided.

Why is Google introducing the change?

Google notes that the feature is designed to help search users "make a more informed decision about the sites" that they visit. The added information can give users " context or peace of mind" according to the announcement.

Closing Words

The new three-dots menu adds an option on mobile to look up the full address of a search result without leaving the Google search results page or complicated actions. Mobile space is limited, and it happens that the full URL of a site is not displayed in the mobile results.

The Wikipedia description that Google displays is very short; a link to Wikipedia is provided to read the entire entry on the site. Google does display a widget with information about the top search result when available; this widget includes additional information and it is unclear why Google is not displaying all the information in the new overlay as well.

Google did not reveal plans to roll out the feature to other regions at the time of writing.

Now You: What is your take on the new option?

Summary
The three-dots menu in Google Search next to results? It's a new feature!
Article Name
The three-dots menu in Google Search next to results? It's a new feature!
Description
Google has started the rollout of a new Google Search feature yesterday for users in the United States. The change adds a three-dots menu to each site listed by Google Search in the results.
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Ghacks Technology News
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Comments

  1. Anonymous said on April 23, 2021 at 6:00 pm
    Reply

    Stupid useless change

  2. Amir said on March 17, 2021 at 1:56 am
    Reply

    It’s a pity that it is only available in the US. Martin, do you know when this will be out globally?

  3. Anonymous said on March 11, 2021 at 9:11 pm
    Reply

    Google is evil, et al. At least by the above, it’s nice to know that I’m not alone in realizing that. Whatever happened to “Don’t be evil”? Whatever happened to “I may not agree with what you say but will defend to the death your right to say it.”
    Google is ‘Leading The Way!” towards modern fasci-communism. (Actually, you sorry sacks of shit have pretty much gotten there.)

  4. Gerald Brennan said on February 7, 2021 at 5:52 pm
    Reply

    Linking it to Wikipedia just makes this another censorship tool.
    I use Brave browser and Duck Duck Go for searches. Google is better for searches but stupid to use if your search is political, or even sociological. Don’t be told what to think.

  5. Anonymous said on February 6, 2021 at 10:27 am
    Reply

    Google is evil

  6. Anonymous said on February 5, 2021 at 3:32 am
    Reply

    It’s not a search engine anymore when it makes political and financial decisions that benefit a single party. Google has become another gatekeeper like AOL or Yahoo, or any other number of obsolete biased, deceptive sites.

    1. truthy said on February 5, 2021 at 2:32 pm
      Reply

      @Anonymous Yes, Google is part of The Cabal who are brainwashing users into corporate slaves who are being sent to the Moon to build secret, underground cities for the lizard people elites who are escaping our flat Earth before the feared Zero Point Catastrophe happens.

      1. Gerald Brennan said on February 7, 2021 at 5:53 pm
        Reply

        Spoken like a good little zombie.

  7. chesscanoe said on February 4, 2021 at 3:07 pm
    Reply

    I should have said 3 vertical dots â‹® , a vertical ellipsis as Martin indicates.

  8. chesscanoe said on February 4, 2021 at 2:39 pm
    Reply

    If you do a search and get https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/7489871?hl=en#zippy=%2Cthis-isnt-my-site , clicking on the new horizontal ellipsis (3 dots or … ) shows information you may have in fact expected.

    I am using Chrome Version 89.0.4389.40 (Official Build) beta (64-bit) in the US.

  9. Anonymous said on February 4, 2021 at 2:26 pm
    Reply

    But would it prevent people from clicking on fake websites?

    1. Anonymous said on February 5, 2021 at 3:30 am
      Reply

      It will only allow fake websites, all real websites will be blocked. It will be a Google utopia.

  10. Amir said on February 3, 2021 at 12:45 pm
    Reply

    It would be great if it shows accurate domain age as well.

  11. pndy said on February 3, 2021 at 12:00 pm
    Reply

    It’s all about artificially keeping user on the search result page where it can be trapped into looking at entries that beside real sites are also ads and as well as profiling user better via these 3-dotted clicks – these will give false information that user is interested in particular topic and that gives a chance to dump unrelated ads.

    1. Prosecco said on February 4, 2021 at 10:22 am
      Reply

      @pndy Yes, and those pages also have subminimal messages that brainwash users into corporate slaves who are being sent to the Moon to build secret, underground cities for the lizard people elites who are escaping our flat Earth before the feared Zero Point Catastrophe happens.

  12. ShintoPlasm said on February 3, 2021 at 11:11 am
    Reply

    This sounds like an initial step towards labeling websites based on their political bent. Scary red exclamation mark for right-wing stuff, green fluffy smiley for left-wing stuff.

    1. JakeValentino said on June 17, 2021 at 6:27 pm
      Reply

      This new button is incredibly annoying on mobile devices if you want to go the Cached page of a search result – the little menu is not well made for mobile browsers and is extremely frustrating.

      Additonally, ShiuntoPLasm is 100% CORRECT

      Its sad that some people so blinded their biases that they cannot realize that Google is actively filtering search results that they don’t like – now they can also add BS descriptions to websites such as, say TheFederalist, labeling it “Fake News” and actively supressing it and all similair sites from search resutls – even when you type the exact title of articles from such websites. They are entire studies documenting this.The fact of the matter is the that the NYT, CNN, etc all have pumped-out far more “Fake News” than anyone else; and Google and their ilk slander people with impunity and censor sources foir things that the censored-sites have all turned out to be correct about.

      Lies pumped out by mainstream media that Google (YouTube) and all Social Media censored:

      *The Lab Origins of the Virus
      *T never ordered his administration to forcibly clear Lafayette Park for a ‘photo op’ at St. John’s Church.
      *Hunter B’s laptop was not “hacked” – during an election the latop’s evidence of pay-for-access to the former then VP B was suppressed form Americans viewing it due to false accusations of hacking
      *President T never told Georgia election officials to ‘find evidence of fraud.’
      *Russian Bounties for American Soldiers in Afghanistan – never happened
      *The entire narrative about the “Covington Kids” was false
      *They Jussie Smollett hoax
      *The Russian dossier hoax
      *President T never saying there were “fine people” on both sides at a deadly protest – and not reasing very next sentence where he explicitly rejects white supremes
      *President T never called illegal immigrants “animals”;
      * Pres T didn’t “flat-out lie” when he said O ‘wiretapped’ his 2016 campaign — O did do that or, at least, his administration did
      * Pres T never ‘removed a bust of Martin Luther King’ from the Oval Office

      … You get the idea

      But if you try find anything on any of those topics via Google search, you will directed to sources that LIED, or at best were dead wrong, about all of these topics. Hilariously if you search DuckDuckGo for the same topics, their search-results are not artificially-curated, and you will find information from both sides of the aisle on a topic. Unfortunately since google directs >90% of all search traffic, they effect how other websites page-rank algorithms display search results. So effectivey, Google is able to Censor the entire internet to a significant extent.

  13. Jojo said on February 3, 2021 at 8:50 am
    Reply

    It will take away some page views as most people can find what they want in the 1st paragraph summary that Wikipedia often puts on top and what I think that Google will be displaying.

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