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Take a closer look at the new Twitter homepage layout (Click to enlarge)

Twitter has a new layout. I just noticed it when creating a new account for my ACT study notes website. To my best knowledge, I was the first Twtter user to tweet about it, too!

Details about Twitter’s New Layout

For now, it looks like Twitter’s new design is only visible to new accounts, or it being rolled out slowly, since my personal @FreeTheFeross account still gets the old layout.

The new design is an incremental improvement for sure, but there are some notable changes which hint at what Twitter’s focus might be in the coming months and years. Here’s a quick summary of the obvious changes:

• New search box at the top right of the page
• Trends drop-down menu, highlighting new Twitter trends.
• Profile and settings links moved below username.

Results Page for Twitter's New Search Box (Click to enlarge)

Prominent Search Box highlights Twitter’s new focus on Search

We all knew that search was going to figure more heavily in Twitter’s strategy, ever since Twitter quietly released a Twitter Search at search.twitter.com. So, it’s not that unexpected that a prominent search box would figure more heavily into Twitter’s redesign.

Twitter’s new search results page looks very similar to the old one. Currently, only users whose accounts have been switched over to the new design can see the new results page. If yours hasn’t been switched yet, then you’ll just have to content yourself with the picture to the right (click to enlarge).

UPDATE (4/5): Twitter did a blog post about this very topic, which they have decided to call the discovery engine. They wrote:

“A few weeks ago we started testing Twitter Search in the web interface for a subset of folks. We had the search box way up near the top of the page and the results on a separate page. It turns out that’s not the awesome way to do it. The best way to experience Twitter Search is when it’s a natural part of your normal Twitter experience.”

So, why is this important? Who cares about a minor redesign of the Twitter homepage?

Google has massive datacenters, but still can't compete with the speed of Twitter.

It’s important because Twitter’s new focus on search has been hailed by some industry analysts as a potential Google Killer, which should make any website publisher, SEO, or pretty much any Internet user’s ears perk up. Twitter gets news fast. REALLY FAST. So fast, that Google’s massive datacenters can’t even compete with Twitter in terms of speed of news coverage. This fact became apparent when one Twitter user tweeted about the Continental 737 Denver plane crash before any major news outlet even got word of the story.

Twitter is also influencing other big Internet players like Facebook. Facebook’s latest face-lift was clearly a response to Twitter’s overwhelming influence, even though Facebook has a substantially larger user base.

So, what does this mean for the future of web search? No one is sure, but one thing is certain. Twitter is shaking things up and causing quite a stir in the valley.

I can’t wait to see what great things they have in store for us in the future.

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