Google's mobile search results are losing this 16-year-old feature for the sake of simplicity

Back in 2009, Google introduced a feature to Search called breadcrumbs. This feature appears next to a search result’s URL and shows where that particular page is located on the site. Previously, you could see breadcrumbs on both desktop and mobile search results, but that is no longer the case.

Google has announced that it is rolling out a change to Search on mobile. Now when you perform a search on mobile, you will no longer see the breadcrumb element with the search result’s URL. However, breadcrumbs will still be present when searching on desktop. You can see an example of the change in the images below.

The image on the left is an example of a search result URL on desktop. You’ll notice that the domain name is followed by arrows, which would be used to show the hierarchy of a webpage’s URL. The image on the right shows what the URL now looks like on mobile, absent of breadcrumbs.

If you’re wondering why Google is making this change, it’s to create a “cleaner, more streamlined look for how URLs appear in search results.” According to the tech giant, this feature isn’t very useful for mobile users and it usually gets cut off on smaller screens anyway.

The update is being applied to Search on mobile in all languages and regions where Search is available. This change will also affect users on tablets.