
The next version of DuckDuckGo - vgnanand
https://next.duckduckgo.com
======
yegg
Hi all, thanks for checking it out and we're looking forward to your feedback!
This next version of DuckDuckGo is in public beta. Here's the post about it I
just made: [https://duck.co/forum/thread/5726/duckduckgo-reimagined-
and-...](https://duck.co/forum/thread/5726/duckduckgo-reimagined-and-
redesigned)

There are still a lot known issues that we're still working through before we
can make the transition. I'm sure this thread will uncover more :)

~~~
diggan
I just tried it out. Wanted to find "phpng" that was released just now. Search
returns results for "phong" and no way to force it to use the term phpng.
Otherwise, it looks good and works as well as the other "older" one. Good job.

~~~
ToastyMallows
You can put quotes around phpng to force DDG to search that word. Though this
should only be a temporary fix until the real problem is fixed.

------
Doctor_Fegg
Looks great!

Your new maps need to have an on-map credit to OpenStreetMap, as that's where
the map data comes from, and OSM's licence requires attribution.
osm.org/copyright explains how.

~~~
aroman
It does. Click the "i" button: Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors, CC-BY-SA

~~~
Doctor_Fegg
That's not on-map, that's hidden behind a click. osm.org/copyright makes it
very clear that the attribution needs to be on-map. You don't see Google
permitting people to hide their brand away like that!

~~~
incanus77
Apple does this too in all of their uses of OSM in their maps.

There is some OSM community discussion on the UX behind this here:
[http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/lxbarth/diary/21769](http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/lxbarth/diary/21769)

~~~
stephen_g
Apple's maps are not just OpenStreetMap - there's a lot of other data sources
in it too.

For the OSM data Apple do use, I think it's quite old OSM data from 2010-2011
or something. As far as I remember, they used that because the license changed
after that, so I believe that's under different terms.

------
ancarda
If you are using DuckDuckGo for privacy reasons, I strongly suggest you use
[https://startpage.com/](https://startpage.com/) instead.

DuckDuckGo isn't much better than Google; both of them hijack your links. This
gives an opportunity to track what you click on. If you watch carefully your
links go to "r.duckduckgo.com" \-- this page also doesn't use SSL. For
example:

[http://r.duckduckgo.com/l/?kh=-1&uddg=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikip...](http://r.duckduckgo.com/l/?kh=-1&uddg=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FDuckDuckGo)

StartPage doesn't hijack links, it (optionally) uses POST and you never send a
referer header so traffic looks organic.

~~~
lucb1e
> StartPage doesn't hijack links, it (optionally) uses POST and you never send
> a referer header so traffic looks organic

... and looks like MSN Search results from 2006. Not just ugly and cluttered,
which I don't mind too much, but dysfunctional too: no keyboard navigation
between results nor editing the search query without using the mouse to focus
the box. That is an immediate no-go for me.

~~~
deno
You can make it look like this:
[https://i.imgur.com/jMucQvl.png](https://i.imgur.com/jMucQvl.png)

I‘m not entirely satisfied with startpage either though. What we really need
is a local search proxy that goes via Google/Bing however you like, e.g. 1)
using clearnet without cookies and cleaning up links (Google, Startpage, Bing)
2) via Tor automatically falling back if you get captcha (with option to do
the captcha if you don’t like results) 3) Like 1) except via some VPN/Proxy

The results from each source (or multiple) could be normalized and the local
app can offer any kind of interface you like.

I’ll write it at some point, but if anyone wants to steal that idea — please
do.

------
TheLoneWolfling
So: feedback.

The contrast is too low. It is hard to read on my (relatively bad) laptop
screen.

Popins only when your mouse is over something are frustrating. My mouse is not
tied to my eyes! In particular, if you're scrolling with your mouse in the
center of the screen, the pop-in happens a moment after you stop scrolling,
which is distracting. Also, I don't like hiding information by default in
general.

Additionally: there is no way to view the full URL for long URLs - they
expand, but only to a point.

The top header staying put is bad from a screen real estate POV. I've got a
widescreen screen, and as such I'm cramped for vertical space but horizontal
space is ample.

Finally: having the right arrow to the left of the domain to search the
domain, and the popin on the right saying "more from <x>" seems redundant.

------
rcamera
Having been using DDG as my primary search engine for pretty much 6 years now,
I really disliked the new redesign.

As mentioned in another comment, the contrast is really bad, I find it hard to
read and focus on a given result. This is much worse when using f.lux.

I also disliked the left-align on everything, I rather have it centered as it
currently is. When using big widescreen monitors there is a lot of whitespace
in the middle of the screen and the results show up all the way to the lower
left corner... It is pretty uncomfortable to look all the way there and this
makes it harder on the contrast part too because there is so much bright light
already coming from the background and the font color is a light greyish. This
is specially worse in multi-monitor setups.

The image and video search tabs are great, and I really like the fact they
replace zero-click results when you click on them, but I wouldn't leave them
in the fixed header, there is just no need for them to be there. This would
reduce the size of the fixed header and make it even better.

When scrolling results using j and k, the greyish background it adds to each
result makes the contrast even worse. I remember when they were yellowish,
they were better back then, imo. But current design works too. I also miss the
current border around it, it makes it much easier for you to find yourself if
you are switching tabs and going back to the results page. I haven't measured,
but the font also seems a couple pixels smaller, is it?

It is also harder to distinguish between results. It all seems like a blob of
text, hard to skim through results looking just at the title. In the current
design this is fantastically easy, given titles are blue. I only read stuff
below the title if the title is of interest. In the new design this is much
harder to do, there is not enough contrast between the title and the text
under it. Keep it blue, there is absolutely no reason to change this.

~~~
yaddayadda
All of what @ rcamera said.

I really like the current visuals and layout much better than the beta,
particularly the contrast and blue links. I also like the favicon to the left
of the page title in results.

I actually like the instant suggestions. And I like the "Images" and "Video"
buttons at the top, _HOWEVER_ I'm a massive !bang! fan, and will differ to !i
and !v. Although I would prefer that both methods go to a generic images and
video searches (as opposed to Google Images and YouTube). ALSO, for me when I
roll over a link I want to see the url in the bottom of my browser (forgetting
what Firefox calls this) and I'm not getting it with the new layouts Video
suggestions.

~~~
belovedeagle
+1 on the blue links. Sure, on most websites blue links might look like the
1990s are calling, but on a search engine with a list of results, there has to
be /something/ to set apart each result from its neighbors. I also like the
brownish urls on the current layout, just because it also serves to set apart
each result.

Unfortunately, in terms of readability, the new layout is a major step
backwards.

------
sergiotapia
Well kudos on letting my right click and copy URL from search results! I hate
how Google insists on using
[https://www.google.com.bo/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=we...](https://www.google.com.bo/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CDUQFjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Fguides.rubyonrails.org%2F4_0_release_notes.html&ei=E-BnU4K0IaTNsQT6x4LwAw&usg=AFQjCNFpeY6-5J6FqUmWRt-
TOBA76MX3Qg&sig2=yDluopjR_TRPimLQt-ohvA) \- yeah Google, totally makes sense.

Godspeed duckduckgo!

~~~
tinalumfoil
The reason Google sends you through a redirect instead of directly to the site
is to prevent those sites from tracking what you searched to get there. When
websites look in their referrer header they'll see
[http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rc...url=http%3A%2F%2Fexample...](http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rc...url=http%3A%2F%2Fexample.org%2F...1,d.aWc")
instead of
"[https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=example"](https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=example").

This gives them the advantage of you only being able to see what Google
Searches brought people to their site through Google Analytics.

~~~
magicalist
> _This gives them the advantage of you only being able to see what Google
> Searches brought people to their site through Google Analytics_

Search terms come in Google's Webmaster Tools. You can only get them in
Analytics if you hook up your Webmaster Tools account to your Analytics
Account.

~~~
path411
It is true that it does promote analytics. However, one key feature of Google
analytics giving privacy as a normal user is that you can never actually look
at the profile of a user. You can look at stats such as 10/100 people used the
"Best Hammers" search term, and that 80/100 people come from the United
States. But you can't say look at X IP address and see where they come from,
what browser they use, and what search term they used.

------
fsck--off
I use DuckDuckGo as my primary search engine and have had a positive
experience using it.

This redesign incorporates two of the worst design trends today: very low
contrast text and gratuitously, obnoxiously large fixed headers.

I dislike fixed headers on any non-phone/tablet UI because almost all laptop
and desktop screens are widescreen. Fixed position elements on the sides of
the screen make much more sense, although poor implementations are very
unpleasant and can create a jarring parallax effect. Unfortunately, fixed
elements on the sides are soooo MySpace and have fallen out fashion, and many
sites waste most of the space on the sides. The header in the redesign in
obscenely large and the new page shows me less results at a time.

I have young and healthy eyes with 20/20 vision. Even so, when I use my laptop
for coding and reading text, I turn the brightness down because it is easier
on my eyes and does not give me headaches. I believe that the best practice is
to make text #000 on a white background or very light background (like news.yc
does), and to let users adjust the brightness of their display if this is
uncomfortable. There have been assertions by that lighter text with white is
better (and unfortunately this is the latest and laziest design trend), but I
have seen no formal evidence of this and believe that this is mostly a
combination of overbright display screens and poor text rendering by OSes and
browsers. If you turn the brightness of your screen down, you solve the "too
much contrast" problem (if it ever truly existed) and can tell when any text
isn't #000. For me, DuckDuckgo's current snippet display color is to light at
#333, and ridiculous at #595959. If I set the brightness of my laptop to the
maximum setting, the snippet text is more tolerable but still uncomfortable.

I dislike the neo-flat, iOS-like buttons, but they don't really make the site
any harder to use. I find that neo-flat buttons are almost have an underlying
hypocrisy. The idea behind the flat painting movement is that you can discern
what was called "optical depth" without using traditional perspective to mimic
the depth you see with stereoscopic vision. The neo-flat movement is based on
the idea that you don't need to underline hyperlinks or add perspective based
shadows and gradients to distinguish what a button is because you can just use
colors alone or make _everything_ a link. If this were really true, then you
wouldn't need to make the neo-flat buttons change colors when you mouse over
them, because it should be obvious that they are links. You can see similar
hypocrisy in Google's A/B testing of non-centered labels in certain neo-flat
buttons on their websites (especially YouTube).

Edit: I rewrote the first sentence of the third paragraph to make it more
clear.

~~~
yegg
Thanks for the feedback! Our current version also has a fixed header, and that
can be turned off in the settings, which we plan to make work in this next
version as well.

Noted on contrast. We will look into it more -- that's exactly the kind of
feedback we were hoping to get.

~~~
teaneedz
I'm in the camp that actually likes the new look. It conveys a modern
minimalist view while the extras just get out of your way.

I've been mostly against flat design for a number of reasons but IMO, you've
achieved a great design. I _really_ like the minimalism of the hamburger
button. Again, everything just gets out of your way.

Perhaps enlarging the font-size of the search result snippets might help with
the contrast complaints - personally, I like your use of the grays. Again, it
conveys a modern design.

I really hope that there will be an updated iOS app soon too :)

~~~
hueving
>it conveys a modern design.

That's a terrible reason to pick a design. If you have no justification for a
design other than 'lots of other new websites do this', then you have no
justification at all... unless your purpose is to blend in and be forgotten.

~~~
timdiggerm
Ah, but an old design conveys amateur quality, which does not compete well in
people's minds with Google, etc.

~~~
CWuestefeld
I don't think that Levi-Strauss is losing market share for not being trendy. A
strong, working product trumps fashion, in my book.

~~~
Angostura
Levi-Strauss uses a deliberately retro design language as a core part of its
marketing. All those rivets and obvious stitches serve little purpose other
than to project an faux-naive olde timey image. I can't see any reason for DDG
to follow a similar design approach, unless they want to go for the Steampunk
user base.

~~~
ugexe
This is not true. If you are a desk jockey then maybe you don't need rivets,
but they (along with all stitching besides the back pocket stitch design)
certainly help keep your denim together if you are the least bit hard on them.
Ripping off pocket corners or blowing out crotch stitching is something that
happens. And I'm pretty sure Levi's also offers denim with non contrast
stitching.

------
Matt_Cutts
Hey Gabriel, congrats on the new launch! The new autocomplete -as-you-type
feature made me curious: you mentioned that you don't associate queries with
IP addresses, but does DDG save queries?

~~~
hjalle
Looks like an already asked question:

    
    
      To be clear, we still don't collect or share personal           
      information and auto-suggest does not impact that at all.
      I   appreciate it may make you and others uncomfortable 
      and we're sensitive to that, but it is not a change in 
      terms of privacy. We simply do not associate queries with 
      personal information (e.g. IP addresses) and in fact    
      don't store any of it at all.
    

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7700960](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7700960)

~~~
Matt_Cutts
I saw that, but it was very delicately worded. For example, if Gabe doesn't
consider the search query to be personal information, then his answer would
allow DDG to save/store search queries. That's why I asked for clarification.

------
bjitty
First impressions are good. Looks clean, I like auto complete. I also like the
autocomplete for shortcuts (!).

I've set it as my home page (was already using ddg for my main search).

Is there a way to turn off the links at the bottom under the search? Set as
homepage, etc? I keep mousing over them and the popups are distracting. I
understand why they need to be there for new users.

Great work and thanks for what you do.

~~~
daGrevis
To continue about auto-complete, would it be possible to add Tab button as a
valid button to go to the next item (Shift-Tab to go back)?

------
gk1
I'm getting a weird bug that's making the results page un-usable:

When I move my cursor up and down in the results area, the listings start
scrambling around like crazy. I can't even tell if they're being scrolled
through or if they're just randomly changing.

I am on a Lenovo Yoga 13 (which is an ultrabook with a touchscreen) using
Chrome 34.0.1847.131 m on Windows. I suspect DDG thinks I'm on a mobile device
and then interprets cursor movements as finger swiping.

Edit: Yep, seems to think I'm on a mobile device. Menu is hidden behind a menu
icon, but I can't get it to open with a mouseclick--only with a tap on the
screen. The site is _completely unusable_ for anyone with a Windows 8 laptop
(ie, laptops with touchscreens), unless they're using it exclusively as a
tablet.

------
cubancigar11
I sure hope I am not the only one who dislikes the new look. Ref:

1\. Old DDG:
[http://s388.photobucket.com/user/cubancigar11/media/snapshot...](http://s388.photobucket.com/user/cubancigar11/media/snapshot2.png.html)

2\. New DDG:
[http://s388.photobucket.com/user/cubancigar11/media/snapshot...](http://s388.photobucket.com/user/cubancigar11/media/snapshot1-4.png.html)

There are so many problems here:

1\. Poor contrast of font-colors.

2\. Poor choice of font - bold doesn't really standout as much as it should.

3\. Font spacing has increased which forces me to scroll down thus breaking my
thought process.

4\. Icons now take vertical space instead of horizontal.

5\. Mouse-hover color change has poor contrast. On my desktop I can only see
it through a specific unnatural angle.

~~~
ep103
I think it looks better than the original, though. That giant red bar at the
top, with a yellow box underneath always reminded me of the original ask
jeeves search page, with its giant blue bar up top
[http://i.imgur.com/7LYUXre.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/7LYUXre.jpg)

------
opendomain
I hate to say this, because I am a BIG fan of DuckDuckGo, but I think your
ranking algorithm can be improved.

I collect domains for my open source project, OpenDomain. The sites do not
actually have too much valuable content - just placeholders so people can find
them.

I just checked, and quite a few of my domains are listed very highly on DDG.
Not that I am complaining, but I think they are rated high just because the
keywords are in the domains themselves.

For example, "NoSQL", "JSON", "Free TV", "liposculpture", "WebPlatform", and
"Helpher" all scored top hits for my sites.

I am not asking for my sites to be removed specifically, but we should try to
get better results - I have done NOTHING for SEO on these domains - just owned
the keyword.

~~~
rk0567
I've also observed that, .com, .net domains rank much higher (even if it's not
any good) as compared to less popular extensions (.me, .co etc).

------
Skalman
In general, it looks really good.

\- I'd like some more focus on keyboard navigation. Make sure that everything
looks good when tabbing, even if you've used arrow keys first.

\- Anti-phishing: A long domain name will trim the end in the "More from ..."
link. Instead it would make sense to trim the beginning.

\- Needs better contrast.

------
rockdiesel
Why does DDG display rover.ebay.com links in search results?

From my understanding rover.ebay.com is used for ebay affiliate links. Is this
one way DDG makes money? If not, why would they display rover.ebay.com links
in search results over traditional ebay links?

EDIT: Looks like I answered my own question. They generate revenue through
affiliate links.

For anyone else curious, here's the link -
[https://duck.co/help/company/advertising-and-
affiliates](https://duck.co/help/company/advertising-and-affiliates)

------
blueskin_
Finally: A redesign that isn't a 'remove everything useful' one. That said,
the low contrast text is a pain to read (still some metro-ification, I guess),
the results page's information density is too low, and the scroll effect feels
like I'm on the brink of getting motion sickness (something I've only ever
experienced with javascript fake scroll, I might add)).

Also, horizontal scrolling: Please, PLEASE, no. It's just horrible and should
die.

------
systemizer
I don't understand how a service can be both secure and centralized. You'd
have to give 100% of your trust to a single entity. I'm not pointing fingers,
but DDG is a good example of this situation.

If you want greater security, you have to allocate trust amongst many
entities. This is a practical Byzantine Fault Tolerance problem
([http://techtv.mit.edu/videos/16444-practical-byzantine-
fault...](http://techtv.mit.edu/videos/16444-practical-byzantine-fault-
tolerance) ).

My current trust model is primarily made up of my friends and family; not a
third party organization online, regardless of how they market it. If I put my
trust in them, my security would only be compromised if ((N-1)/3) worked
together. (see [http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/6.824-2012/papers/castro-
practical...](http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/6.824-2012/papers/castro-
practicalbft.pdf)) Wouldn't my activity be more secure if it was built upon
that?

I'm not proposing any implementations; just food for thought.

------
johnnyg
DDG has been my primary search engine for nearly 2 years. I love you guys for
both your service and your mission.

You've struggled in the past with local searches and map inferences to non-
address searches (think "Godwin Park Houston").

I threw those at next.ddg and the result back were very good. I don't see
having to !g a query for these in future.

I'll edit as I use the beta in the next few days but first impression is "Hot
damn, it works! Good job!"

Edit 1: There are still dot coms and business I search for that I don't get
the "map this for me" option. Examples:

[https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=cpap.com](https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=cpap.com)

[https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=men%27s+warehouse](https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=men%27s+warehouse)
(do I want a wiki article or do I want to find the ones close?)

[https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=whole+foods](https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=whole+foods)

Edit 2: The UI is so clean and nice.

~~~
highwind
Try this query:
[https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=whole+foods+falls+church+va](https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=whole+foods+falls+church+va)

~~~
timr
[http://www.bing.com/search?q=whole+foods+falls+church+va&go=...](http://www.bing.com/search?q=whole+foods+falls+church+va&go=&qs=n&form=QBLH&pq=whole+foods+falls+church+va&sc=2-25&sp=-1&sk=&cvid=7991e2a1bb3240d39d121259048b70d7)

------
brokenparser
I love Duck and the focus on privacy it has, but lately I've been using searx
and had more success with it than ddg given the same queries. You can find
running instances here: [https://github.com/asciimoo/searx/wiki/Searx-
instances](https://github.com/asciimoo/searx/wiki/Searx-instances)

------
bluthru
Please make the fixed header half as tall. Put "Images Video" to the side of
the search box.

This is nitpicky, but I don't like how an entire result is a link with a
hovered background color. I also don't like how additional content appears
when hovered. Please don't trim the URL and hide it unless the result is being
hovered on.

------
ugexe
Something that has bothered me in the old version as well as this version is
the wiki-summary/product/images/videos header. Often times (especially when im
using a VPN) the search results load before whatever needs to be loaded in the
header, so I will go to click a result and then the header expands into my
click. This means I go to a page I did not intend. It needs to be a fixed size
or its size needs to be determined before listing search results.

~~~
MrGando
I totally hate that Header too.

------
ThePhysicist
Of course the first thing I did was a vanity search of my name and I have to
say I'm really impressed (and a bit shocked) by the quality of the results:

All my social media profiles, all my websites, every project I contributed to,
even websites where people credited me for my work when they used it in their
own projects, all neatly sorted and with great context information. Definitely
on par, if not better, than Google and visually much easier to digest. Amazing
job!

~~~
davidcelis
Wish I could say the same :\\. The top result for "David Celis" is a LinkedIn
directory of people with my name. The first result that's actually me is my
Twitter account, at number 3. My actual homepage,
[http://davidcel.is/](http://davidcel.is/), doesn't even appear on the first
page. Guess I need to become more important?

------
higherpurpose
I'm not up to date on what kind of algorithm you're using, but last I checked
you were still mostly relying on Bing, is that true? Are you guys working on
your own search/indexing engine so you don't depend on any of the big guys
that might eventually pull the rug from under you?

I guess what I'm saying is, if Microsoft were to deny you access to Bing
tomorrow, would DDG still be a pretty good search engine, or would it fall
apart?

------
NamTaf
Please make sure the hamburger menu button on the right and the close X button
inside the menu are centred (edit: with respect to one another) - currently,
the close button shifts down and left from the position of the hamburger
button. Keeping it in the one spot is one of those polish things that
instantly stands out to me.

------
saiko-chriskun
I would really love to switch but it still pales in comparison to google on a
lot of searches.

[http://bit.ly/1ur3zP2](http://bit.ly/1ur3zP2) vs.
[https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=medium+top+collections](https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=medium+top+collections)

~~~
gabriel34
not sure what are you talking about. Google results for me are as follow:

1\. medium.com/collections

2\. medium.com/top100/may-2013 (what I would be looking for except it's from
last year)

3\. an article with the title "Top Medium Collections everybody should follow"

4\. images (why here?) of... purses and drawer handles?(wtf? why is this
here?)

5\. List of Medium collections | Niccolò Brogi

At the side some advertising for something that looks like bird cages or
outdoor lamp protectors from Google Shops and "Tops at Macy's‎"

DDG's:

1.Medium Top 100 for March 2014 (much more recent than googles and at 1st
position)

~~~
gabriel34
To be honest DDG's other results were pretty much garbage for this query, but
in the end of the day it brought me a much more relevant page in it's number 1
spot without tracking me.

Maybe you trained google well. I have not used it much in ages

------
Jake232
I've always wondered. How do these guys hit google search so much without
hitting limitations?

Google is pretty aggressive at banning bots, and I can't imagine Google have
given a competitor API access or something like that. Proxies is out of the
question for this scale too.

~~~
dmunoz
I'm fairly certain that they do not proxy searches to Google.

I heave heard that they do use Bing and Yahoo search APIs, but this could be
incorrect.

~~~
Mithrandir
You're correct:
[https://duck.co/help/results/sources](https://duck.co/help/results/sources)

------
mryingster
Thank you for adding image search! That's about the only thing I really rely
on Google for. Giving it its own dedicated full page rather than just a
section would be very welcomed as well.

Two other things. Others have mentioned having the links always blue, not just
when rolling over. I would like this as well to make it a little quicker/more
evident where the physical link is.

Secondly, I like the link to see more results from whichever domain, however I
am wondering if we can also have a "hide results from whatever domain" so we
can hide useless spammy domains that may show up in our results. This is a
huge problem on Google, though I haven't noticed it as badly on DDG.

At any rate, I love DDG! Thanks for the hard work!

------
antris
Based in US, the line "The search engine that doesn't track you" means
nothing.

~~~
JunkDNA
Please don't keep it to yourself! What is this privacy-protecting search
engine that you've been using that is immune to US or other intelligence
agencies' snooping?

~~~
gabriel34
If they snoop your logs, but you have no information on your users then they
will get nothing. If they can snoop your traffic live than pretty much yes,
anything US based is vulnerable, but at least my information is not being sold
and traded between private companies.

------
k-mcgrady
Looks beautiful. My only criticism is that you could make better use of all
the whitespace the the right on the search screen. Maybe expand the width of
search items to fill some unused space + increase the number of search items
above the fold.

~~~
moollaza
You can actually increase the width of the results, if you prefer. It's in the
settings:
[https://next.duckduckgo.com/settings](https://next.duckduckgo.com/settings)

Click on the "Look and Feel" tab, then change the "width" :)

~~~
k-mcgrady
Great, that looks better, thanks.

------
dusklight
So understandably you don't want to be too specific about how you pick search
results to beat the seo people, but could you talk briefly about how ddg
returns results? Is it still some variant of PageRank?

------
neil_s
The design is nice, but I still don't find the results relevant (from the
small sample size that I tested). For example, I searched for 'alternatives to
minimum wage' because of a recent debate, and got Yahoo Answers as the first
result, with a bunch of unknown sites after. On the other hand, Google
returned the Washington Post, Bloomberg View and other credible organisations.

The design is certainly much nicer on the eyes, without the blue links and
with the little 'read' tick marks, but perhaps the focus should be on better
search algorithms first?

------
mstade
I tried switching to DuckDuckGo about 8 months ago, maybe a year, but
eventually went back to using Google simply because DuckDuckGo's search
results were not nearly relevant enough. When I saw this redesign I was
compelled to give it another try, and I'm happy to say that the results are
way better than they used to be. The new UI is also very comfortable, and
brings most features up to par with Google, especially the image and video
search.

This is great work, and I'm very glad to now switch back to DuckDuckGo as my
search engine of choice. Thanks!

------
jbail
The Related Topics algorithm needs a lot work.

I search for "Denver" and the top related topic is "Gang Activity in Denver."
Really?

I search for "Chicago" and the entire related topics list is places on the
historic register in Chicago. Really? The whole list?

I'd turn this off until you make it work better. It grabs a lot of attention
and degrades the rest of the experience. My first impression is that if DDG
gets that part so wrong, what else are they getting wrong with the search
results? Cruel, perhaps, but that's my impression.

The new interface is nice and fast otherwise.

------
jonalmeida
I started using DDG a long time ago when it first came out. I asked for a few
stickers to add at my IT department, but I got a good bunch instead.

There are now random DDG stickers in various cities around southern Ontario.

~~~
pestaa
Any way to get some more in Europe?

~~~
jonalmeida
You can buy some from:
[http://www.stickermule.com/duckduckgo](http://www.stickermule.com/duckduckgo)

I still have a few with me. I can send you some if you want (contact details
in profile).

------
monotypical
Just wanted to say, had heard a lot about ddg, but I never really gave it a
fair shot until now, and it's awesome, before you even get to the privacy
stuff!. Thanks.

------
timgws
The one thing that kills be about DDG is that when I search for "who is the
prime minister of australia" it get's nearly everything wrong.

Google gives me a result of a name ("Tony Abbott"), while DDG starts giving me
an article from Wikipedia describing the role (this one is forgivable...)

DDG Images shows the first six images as being previous prime ministers.

[http://imgur.com/a/wWgXD](http://imgur.com/a/wWgXD)

------
curiouscats
The one box can be nice but takes up too much room so I have it set to off. It
would be better if you gave me a simple click to view one box (I can often
guess the small number of cases where viewing it would be useful - such as
thinking a map will show up or in the case I wanted the wiki summary).

Off the top of my head just having a link after the products link that said
0-click box (or something) if it was settings had it off would be useful.

------
mercnet
I just recently switched to duckduckgo and I wasn't a fan of the search
results UI (spent a lot of time in settings) but this looks beautiful!

------
claudius
There doesn’t really seem to be any improvement over the old page and the only
thing that annoys me with the old page (used with kj=b2&kl=wt-
wt&ko=f&kp=-1&kx=b) is the fact that instant answers are loaded not
immediately. That is, if I click on the first link before WolframAlpha pops up
with something more-or-less helpful, I sometimes accidentally click on that
area.

------
bhartzer
One of the problem I see is that it appears that this version is that there is
too much emphasis on keyword rich domain names. On one search query that I did
just now, 14 of the top 20 search results for that had the keyword in the
domain name.

A similar search (different city + keyword search), different city but same
keywords as above, reveals 15 with the keyword out of 20 search results.

------
yahelc
Anyone know how DDG is detecting this:

> Your browser indicates if you've visited this link.

I was under the impression that browsers try to block sites from being able to
detect this. Traditionally, the hack has been with the :visited pseudo-class,
but not sure if there's more at play here.

Kind of a weird feature for a search engine whose tagline is "The search
engine that doesn't track you."

~~~
lojack
It appears to use the :visited pseudo-class. You'll notice if you click that
area it'll link to the page.

------
yetfeo
One thing that would be nice to fix in the new interface:

If I use the DDG TOR hidden service, 3g2upl4pq6kufc4m.onion, do a search and
click on a search result the link goes via a DDG redirect from
r.duckduckgo.com. This should be using the hidden service domain, not the
duckduckgo.com domain. As it is the redirect goes over a tor exit node rather
than directly via the hidden service.

------
plainOldText
I really like the simplicity of this version of DuckDuckGo. The only thing I'd
change, is the color used for domains. I personally look at the domain (among
other things) when I decide to click on a result, and having a more noticeable
domain name would be extremely helpful allowing me to quickly make a decision
about which results are worthy.

Just my personal thoughts.

------
nfriedly
Shoot! I'll be able to retire
[http://ddgg.nfriedly.com](http://ddgg.nfriedly.com) soon!

~~~
nfriedly
Doh! That was supposed to say "Whoot!" but my phone autocorrected it and I
didn't notice until after the edit timer was up.

But to clarify, I'm happy DDG is incorporation this feature :)

------
dieg0
Nice redesign, as a designer, developer and user: I like

I don't like the way that video search is actually Youtube search (to use
'video' is misleading, sad face). And I imagine when it comes to images is the
same.

DuckDuckGo, if you would please add other media sources... Google used to do
this, now it's all about keeping the user inside Google’s ecosystem.

~~~
cainetighe
We originally prototyped videos with several providers including Vimeo,
YouTube, and DailyMotion. Sadly there was an immediate (and difficult) safe
search problem and we decided to table re-enabling the others until after we
got some feedback about how it worked.

------
morgangiraud
This is not very important but yet there are a few typos on
[https://next.duckduckgo.com/about](https://next.duckduckgo.com/about)

"Less Clutter block" Our only focus is search. That means that our results are
free of promotoions <\--

"Discuss block" Our forums are a place -->for to<\-- chat

------
nemoniac
I also use DuckDuckGo as my primary search engine and have had very positive
experience using it.

But the single worst thing about ddg is that it's still not possible to
deactivate the "did you mean?" functionality. I rarely make typing errors so I
spend most keystrokes on ddg putting quotes around things that I did mean.

------
joeblau
I might switch back to this. Google is becoming more useless to me at it
attempts to be everything to everybody else.

------
idealform01
I really like the new visual design, slick work!

One issue I have is with the infinite scrolling of the results. When at the
bottom of the page I would like to know how many more results there are so I
am not flying blind until I randomly get to the end of the results. Not aware
of any formal studies to support this just opinion :)

------
olq
I think it looks great! Tried it in my kind of night mode: dimmed display,
very orange f.lux setting and inverted colours, and it works good. I like the
design a lot! Why not widening the results column in larger windows and thus
fit more results vertically? Maybe really large site logos/icons would be
cool.

------
agazso
Scrolling is broken on Safari iOS7. The default behavior in Safari is when you
scroll up, the controls appear (url bar, back/forward button, other tabs
button etc.)

It seems DDG implements its own scrolling, so scrolling up does not make the
controls appear, which is quite unexpected and makes a bad user experience.

------
alexman
Just because it lets me use "j" "k" to navigate the search results and "/" to
highlight the search text is enough a temptation for me to contemplate dumping
Google. I hate how Google forces me to press "Tab" and the up/down arrow keys
to navigate.

------
dabrowski
Where is "Try this search on:" box that used to be on the right hand side? I
found it extremely useful.

Also the dropdown in search button that allowed to, say, sort the results by
date. (I often forget query parameters)

Overall I like the esthetic direction ddg is taking, unfortunately I found two
good features missing.

------
mihok
I used to use DDG as my primary search provider for half a year, was unhappy
with the user experience/search results but after a couple preliminary
searches, everything is looking up! Well done DDG, really, really stoked for
you guys to get better. (And it looks like you definatly are!)

------
atmosx
I would love to use DDG as my default search engine but anything other than
Google is extremely poor when it comes to the non-English side of the WWW.
Google was way better at sorting Greek web-pages last time I checked. I'll
give DDG another try though, might turned better...

------
YoukaiCountry
One thing that is bothering me is the filling in of search queries when you
mouse over them. One wrong move with the mouse if you have a query partially
typed in, and you have to backspace all of the automatically filled in stuff.
Other than that, I think it's pretty nice.

------
CmdrKrool
I can't turn off the infinite scroll. I've set "Auto-load" in the settings to
Off. But when I scroll to the end of the page new links still get appended
automatically. This also happens on the current version DDG as well. Am I
misunderstanding this option?

~~~
yegg
What browser/OS?

~~~
CmdrKrool
Firefox 28 on Windows XP. My usual browser, loaded up with all kinds of
extensions and stuff, so I also tried:

Chrome 35.0.1912.2 (from portableapps.com) on Windows XP.

So as to make sure it's not my fault for using XP, I went and updated my Arch
Linux box and tried:

Firefox 29.0 on Arch Linux

Chromium 34.0.1847.132 on Arch Linux

Both of those browsers are untouched by extensions.

In every one of these cases, I go to duckduckgo.com or next.duckduckgo.com, go
to the settings, change "Auto-load" to 'Off', type the test search "Rob
Hubbard" into the search box at the top, press enter, scroll to the bottom of
the page by dragging the scrollbar with the mouse, and see the text "More
Links..." automatically change to some animated dots and then the further
results appear a moment later.

Hope all this detail is helpful!

------
dredmorbius
I've been using DDG intermittently for the past two years, and solidly (with
fallbacks to other search engines) since June, 2013.

Overall the design looks decent. Remember: less is more.

I don't know if features were modified since fskc--off posted, but I'd agree
strongly with both his primary concerns: ditch _ALL_ fixed headers and
footers, on _ALL_ devices, and keep maximal contrast throughout the site. My
eyes are no longer quite so young as they once were, and low contrast designs
are bullshit. The "off-black on off-white" argument applies _only_ to print
materials, not online, where contrasts are inherently lower, and are
_worsened_ by increased ambient light.

I find the grey background on the focused search entry distracting. I've
removed it. The outline is sufficient (if not excessive itself).

I find the font sizes in general too small. I prefer specifying fonts in
_points_ not _pixels_ , and very, very strongly recommend that _all_ text-
oriented dimensions be either in ems or percentage of screen width. In
general, _don 't size text elements_ if you can help it. I set an overall
content width of between 45-50em for most sites, with a minimum 2em margin
(and that's as a fallback). I apply my own CSS to many sites I visit, some
1000+ at present (yes, including HN, increasing contrast and font sizes being
principle changes).

I notice the browser URL no longer reflects the present search. I dislike that
change as I'll copy and paste search URLs fairly frequently. Please retain the
previous behavior.

The search syntax icons on the RH side of the page underneath the "Spread DDG"
link looked at first to me like social share link crap (another feature I
strip from most sites). I'd suggest putting the "spread" link elsewhere and
more clearly differentiating it from the actual search tools.

Of features missing on DDG which force me back to other sites, the lack of
time-bounded search is probably the biggest (other than simply lacking
expected search results). I've been impressed by the integration of
OpenStreetMap results and would like to see similar type development, as well
as your use of Wikipedia and similar informational sources in results.

Overall: fairly subtle changes, and gripes notwithstanding, not bad. That's
actually high praise ;-)

Also: I'd _very much_ like to thank you for actually previewing the design in
advance of releasing it. While online services make drastic changes possible,
they're not always welcome, and I feel far too many sites make the egregious
error of dropping a new design on users with no warning.

For the "next.duckduckgo.com" site, I've got the following CSS tweaks
presently applied. All but the last are legacy, some may no longer be strictly
necessary:

    
    
        #header_wrapper {
            position: static;
        }
    
        #header_wrapper #header #header_content_wrapper #header_content #header_button_wrapper #header_button #header_button_menu_wrapper #header_button_menu {
            z-index: 2;
        }
    
        #search_form {
            font-size: 15pt;
        }
    
        .bang_suggestion:hover {
            background-color: rgb(228,246, 255);
        }
    
        .bangwrap {
            z-index: 2;
        }
    
        .snippet {
            font-size: 14pt;
        }
    
        p, body p, li, body li, dt, body dt, dd, body dl {
            font-size: 15pt;
        }
    
        .web-result:hover {
            background: none;
            background-color: inherit;
        }

~~~
sdougbrown
I think you'll probably want to remove those font-size adjustments and re-
assess afterwards. You'll find that the majority of the redesign is indeed
sized with ems, including all text sizes. You'll also want to adjust
#header_wrapper to position:absolute if you deice that you're not going to use
the settings to disable the fixed header behaviour - setting static without
adjusting the settings will be unpleasant. To be safe, in case you want to
play with the header settings later, you probably want to actually make that
selector `.set-header--fixed .header-wrap { position: absolute' }`

~~~
dredmorbius
I'll re-review. The font sizes I suspect I'll keep. They're pretty standard
across most sites I use, though for text-heavy ones that are actually
document-based, I'll even bump them up further -- 17-18pt for true long-form
reads.

Static for header hasn't been an issue for me. Headers that are sufficiently
annoying just get iced ;-)

------
cyborgx7
Maybe it's just me but I find the hamburger menu in the top right , now that
firefox has one of those themeselves in a similar place, kind of unpleasing.

I also miss all the colours and I prefer when search buttons are actual
buttons instead of an icon inside the text field.

------
shenoybr
It is really beautiful. The minimalistic user interface is much more usable
now. And the results for some test queries I ran were pretty good. Great work!
I'm going to switch my default search engine for a few days and see how that
goes.

------
jan3er
About the top row showing About/Images/Videos etc. I would like to use my
vertical scroll wheel to move to the left and right instead of having to
travel with my mouse all the way to the corner to hit the red arrow-button.

------
sjs382
Proxima Nova at 600 weight displays really weird on my work machine:
[http://i.imgur.com/O9GU0TG.png](http://i.imgur.com/O9GU0TG.png).

Is there a chance you might reconsider the font choice?

Looks great, if I force Helvetica.

~~~
sdougbrown
Do you have Proxima Nova installed locally? The font stack does look for a
locally installed version of the font first - it looks like it's applying the
900 font weight instead of 600.

~~~
sjs382
I did. Seems that I had the regular weight and black version only. Disabled
the "black" and it is rendering better now.

Looks amazing, once I fixed that issue.

------
mfrommil
Would be great if the settings menu expanded with hovering instead of a click
(similar to the 3 buttons on the bottom). It's far enough to the side that
accidental hovers could be avoided, while saving a click.

------
gabriel34
Wow!

Loved it, very clean yet all the info is there

Plus image and video search! Really nice to have a clean image search
interface with a clear download button. Do you proxy my search to youtube?
What other sites are there?

EDIT: also, great response to browser zoom

------
im3w1l
If I may make a feature request: I would like some way to search that
preserves symbols in the query. For instance I would like to be able to search
for L _a_ b* and not get results for L-A-B, L.A.B etc.

------
Buonaparte
I just want to say that I love DuckDuckGo. I feel like the majority of search
results I get from Google and Bing these days are just advertising one thing
or another. DuckDuckGo is a much better experience.

------
n3thin
Minor Nitpick!! You got the spelling wrong for promotions at
[https://next.duckduckgo.com/about?t=i&kd=-1](https://next.duckduckgo.com/about?t=i&kd=-1)

------
Splendor
Chrome 34 on Windows 7. Can't read this bubble when it's on the first result:
[https://i.imgur.com/SrplpW4.png](https://i.imgur.com/SrplpW4.png)

------
prakashk
The "What is this?" link below Cloud Save buttons doesn't respond (Firefox
30.0a2 on Ubuntu 12.04). Right-click and Open Link in a New Tab results in a
"403 Forbidden".

------
twodayslate
The frontpage is a lot more pleasing to the eye, however, the search results
are much more readable on the current layout. The text is not very crisp under
Chrome on my Windows 8.1 machine.

------
peutichat
If you're into alternative search engines that don't track you, You should try
psykoo: [http://www.psykoo.com](http://www.psykoo.com)

~~~
dewey
\- So they are not tracking me, but everyone else is reading my search queries
because there's no https support.

\- It's really slow

\- It's ugly

No thanks.

------
ErikRogneby
I like it. my one nitpick:

On Mobile, if you do "show more meaning" there is no undo of that action. I
thought the X might collapse down to the preview but it removed it altogether.

------
MicroBerto
Congrats on the launch!

At what point will your business development team be ready to discuss
integrating new spices?

We have one coming that I think your team and users would like more than the
existing one.

~~~
yegg
Right now! bd@duckduckgo.com

------
dpatrick86
Please continue working on the non-aesthetic fundamentals.

I reported this query previously to you guys, and it appears nothing has
happened. It concerns me because it's so nonsensical it erodes my trust in
your results, and it has persisted like this for over a year at this point....

If you search "IGF-1" on DDG you get _maybe_ 100 results. Now lets try the
same search on Google, but with a handicap. Let's be even more strict and only
show results that contain this keyword specifically in the title using
"intitle:igf-1". You'll find 69,500 results (at the time of this posting).

~~~
boyter
I cannot edit my other post, but paging through Google gives 363 pages...

[https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=IGF-1#hl=en&q=IG...](https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=IGF-1#hl=en&q=IGF-1&start=370)

Far less then the 5 million it claims to know about on the first page,

[https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=IGF-1#hl=en&q=IG...](https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=IGF-1#hl=en&q=IGF-1)

------
stonogo
Please don't apply any of these changes to the html version. It's my favorite
websearch interface.

I would also like an option to disable r.duckduckgo.com redirects.

~~~
claudius
Passing kd=-1 in the URL disables redirects for me.

~~~
stonogo
thanks!

------
BorisMelnik
what a clean look. love the fact that you have incorporated search features
such as the carousel and video previews. I really like duck duck go as a
search engine. I think one of the main reasons I have not fully adopted it is
email/gmail and other Google offerings.

all in all the fact that privacy is on the side of the user is so key for me.
I hate having a copy of everything I Google get stored somewhere, even in
private mode.

------
joshbert
This is fantastic. I already had DDG as my search engine, this just takes it
to the next level. I'll be looking forward to the full release. Kudos!

------
crater
I think they did something good with the way (it seems) they standardized
typing math equations. When you're searching some complicated integral with
fractions and polynomials, you can pretty much put the spaces somewhere
different every time in Google and get a different result. When I started
typing an equation on DuckDuckGo I noticed that it automatically suggests a
search with the spaces taken out of it.

Also, I searched "Juicy J Acapellas" and was impressed because I found some
sites that I enjoyed that I hadn't ever found before.

------
jizzard
I use spacebar and shift+spacebar to scroll up and down pages. The floating
header covers up part of the text so I never get a chance to read it.

------
mfrommil
I really like the transition from normal search -> images & videos.

Wish there was a way to have news embedded in search results similar to
google, though.

~~~
bsstoner
Try adding 'news' to the query:
[https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=amazon+news](https://next.duckduckgo.com/?q=amazon+news)

------
mring33621
Neither button in the "Learn More" dialog works for me. Left click, Chrome
Version 34.0.1847.131 m, Win 7 64 bit

------
dorgo
pls dont open new tabs if a search result is clicked with right mouse button.
I use right mouse button for mouse-gestures. My browser dont permit to disable
right-mouse-button-context-menu. If I click with the right mouse-button on a
search result then a new tab is opened AND a context-menu is shown.

------
NewsReader42
The DDG team still cannot get the simple concept of seraching correct. We have
had a website online for 3 years, every other major search engine finds and
ranks it accordingly yet DDG doesn't even include it in their results.

If they're missing our own website from results how many other websites are
missing from results which ends up not giving the user the BEST choice of
options when performing a search.

------
zephyz
If I disable meanings in the settings I see video and picture results. Is that
the intended behaviour?

------
Aaronneyer
Is there any chance in functionality with the new version or is it just the
prettier search page?

------
pi-squared
Don't center and add the fixed horizontal limit for images when there is an
instant answer.

------
progamler
I like to see full links, that helps me to Validate the source and sort out
webpages

------
Ryel
I think the new look is awesome but I'd still use DDG either way.

------
hrvbr
A search engine that doesn't track me shouldn't use Flash.

~~~
yegg
We don't -- where are you seeing flash?

------
ejain
I'd use it, if only I could get them to index my site...

------
a3n
Very pretty. And thank you for not using infinite scroll.

------
zyang
The button icons are a few px off - very unsettling.

~~~
yegg
Which ones? Perhaps this is a browser issue.

~~~
zyang
Here
[https://www.evernote.com/shard/s259/sh/83a4a781-7511-4815-b6...](https://www.evernote.com/shard/s259/sh/83a4a781-7511-4815-b630-24ae641bc61a/ece030f2680b3a95d9073437704568fa)

------
shmerl
Is it WIP? Default one still looks the way it was.

------
ethana
Off topic, but I still think the domain name is a few strokes too long for
people.

edited: Oh hell no, duck.com redirects to google. That sucks.

duckie.com is parked, buy it?

~~~
orangewarp
It would be a classy move if Google gave duck.com to duckduckgo.

------
jhomhenvhisst
Search: åäö "Showing 35 Ã¥Ã¤Ã¶ Images"

Great.

~~~
cainetighe
Confirm fixed?

~~~
jhomhenvhisst
yes, nice!

------
davidgerard
Introducing: awfulness.js

[http://tommorris.org/posts/2547](http://tommorris.org/posts/2547)

------
marincounty
I hope they destroy Google.

------
galapago
Guide: This room is the most popular part of our tour. Milhouse: It's just
like the other rooms. Guide: Yes, but with one important difference: [looks
over] Oh, they took that out. Yes, it is just like the other rooms.

~~~
prottmann
My personal view:

I am a technican. I want to see the number of results. I don't like AutoSroll.
I remember the page where i find a result, so i jump to the page, with endless
scroll, i did not find things again.

The sign of clicked links is a good idea.

Mark a personal favorite site in combination with my search term would be a
great feature. E.g. i remember i search something about nodejs but i forgot
the sitename, my browser bookmark did not help me. But when i see my old
search about "nodejs" and the favorite or clicked pages, that would be a great
thing.

Forget google, if somebody want to use google, he can use google. So please
implement usefull functions that help people with their daily work.

------
lnanek2
I don't really like the "doesn't track you part." How is it going to give as
good results if it doesn't track people? Clicks is the best way to tell which
results are good, and my clicks especially.

~~~
whatts
You can still count clicks without associating it with the user who clicked.
Anyway, the "doesn't track you" part is the whole point of DDG. If you don't
like/need that, you can simply use Google.

