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If you have searched Google Images recently, you might have noticed the new layout that was rolled out on August 6th. The change has been a bit polarizing for some, so if you want your Google Images to look and feel like they did before the change, there is an extension available for Chrome that will disable the new layout.
Google Images New Layout
The updated design introduces a side panel next to your results when you click on an image and will stay there as you scroll through other results. This is intended to help you compare images more easily and you can use the back button to bring up the last images you clicked.
Google said in a blog post these changes should also make shopping decisions easier by displaying more details under the images like brand information, price, availability, and reviews. For retailers and publishers, they hope these additions to the interface will drive more traffic to sites.
Google Images Restored Extension
The Google Images Restored extension, discovered by Techdows, was released quickly after the update and works extremely well. This extension does not revert your Google Images back to the exact layout from before August 6th, but it is relatively close and makes things generally look like they did before the update. The extension also re-adds the old “View Image” button and removes related searches from results.
The developer has said they are rebuilding the layout from scratch and doesn’t claim the extension is perfect. After reading through the reviews, it is nice to see the developer has also responded to some glaring issues and provided updates as needed. As these things go, I am not sure how long this extension will continue to work. Google could easily make some additional changes on their end that would break this extension, but if you cannot stand the new layout this a great option for the time being.
If you are interested and want to install this extension, you can download the Google Image Restored for Chrome and Firefox. If you want to see the extension source code, you can see it on Github.
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