Google just 'AMPed' up mobile search results

We previously covered Google’s plans for Accelerated Mobile Pages, and many users have already been experiencing it in beta. Now, however, Google has announced that they are formally rolling it out to everyone worldwide.

AMP is a large project that Google has undertaken to make sites load faster on mobile. The idea is to give users a more consistent online experience between desktop and mobile by removing much of the clutter from sites that make navigating them on mobile a pain. This means that using AMP sites will not only load much faster than non-AMP sites, but if you’re on mobile data, these sites will take up roughly one tenth of the data that you would normally use.

When you do a Google search now, your results will show up as normal. However, AMP sites will now be tagged with a small gray indicator. Google says that they’ve created over 600 million of these AMP sites in 232 regions around the world in over 100 languages. In general, they focused on content related to retail, travel, recipes, general knowledge, and entertainment.

There has been some criticism of the plan, but Google is quick to point out that all the search results will be displayed in their original order:

To clarify, this is not a ranking change for sites. As a result of the growth of AMP beyond publishers, we wanted to make it easier for people to access this faster experience. The preview shows an experience where web results that have AMP versions are labeled with the AMP logo. When you tap on these results, you will be directed to the corresponding AMP page within the AMP viewer.

Although the rollout has been kicked off, it will take some time to reach all devices, so you may not be seeing AMPed search results just yet. Rest assured, however, it’s on its way. While we wait, tell us what you think of Google’s Accelerated Mobile Pages in the comments below!