Google is going pretty bold in their latest test of colors in the search results… this time changing the titles from the usual blue to black. But there are many confused searchers as a result of this test, with many thinking they might have malware installed on their computer because the results are so different.
Google seems to have begun the test late Friday or early Saturday, and it does seem to be an international test.
Google has also changed the look of the titles for pages previously visited. If you have previously visited a page before, instead of the usual purple, it shows as a very, very dark grey instead. It is almost indistinguishable from the regular unvisited black links, making it hard to tell if a page has been visited before.
It also changes the look for featured snippets as well.
There are multiple threads on the Webmaster Help forums as well as countless reports on Twitter, so this seems to be a pretty widespread test – far more than the usual 1%. Or people just might be so confused about the choice of black that they are much more vocal about this than other tests.
However, judging from the number of complaints people have about this title color in the search results, I suspect they will go back to testing their 41 shades of blue instead.
Jennifer Slegg
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