Google+ Stream Gets Fresh New Look & Automatically-Added Hashtags At Google I/O

Google announced a number of Google+ upgrades during the keynote presentation at today’s Google I/O, including a new responsive, multi-column layout for Google+ Stream. Now, users will see one, two, or three columns of content depending on their device’s screen size and orientation.

Photos and videos have been enhanced as well, fitting the entire width of the stream. According to the Google+ blog, the new media sizes make images and videos, “…easier to scan and nicer to look at.” Users will also notice new animations in their stream with a bouncing sharebox, cards that “flip and fade” and sliding menus.

[youtube width=”640″ height=”360″]http://youtu.be/vF5RovO5R8w[/youtube]

Automatic Hashtags

In an effort to deepen the user’s content experience, Google+ stream now will automatically add hashtags to posts, so that users can browse related content by clicking on a post of a particular topic. By scanning posts and tagging it accordingly, Google+ will identify and rank relevant conversations based the assigned hashtags.

Many users will be happy to know they can remove automatically-added hashtags from posts at any time.

[youtube width=”640″ height=”480″]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSZ–ul_qYk&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]

Be sure to keep up with more Google I/O announcements as we live blog from the conference. See also our follow-up post, Up Close With The New Google+ Related Hashtags.