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Bing Sitelink Design Tests: What the Reports Actually Show

Reports describe separate Bing tests for sitelink bullets, arrow buttons and underlines. The January 2024 bubbles applied to the search-bar menu, not sitelinks.
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Reports describe several Bing sitelink styling experiments, but they do not confirm light-blue bubbles around desktop sitelinks. In the January 2024 report, bubbles applied to the search-bar menu; sitelinks in result snippets used bullets. Later reports covered separate arrow-button and underline tests.

Are light-blue bubbles appearing around Bing sitelinks on desktop?

That exact appearance is not confirmed by the reports cited here. Search Engine Roundtable documented nearby Bing interface tests, but none establishes that light-blue bubbles surrounded desktop sitelinks, that Microsoft announced such a design, or that it became a broad or permanent change.

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The distinction matters because the January 2024 report described two different elements: a bubble-style treatment for the search-bar menu and bullets for sitelinks in result snippets. The bubbles were not described as a sitelink treatment. Search Engine Roundtable, January 24, 2024

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What Bing sitelink changes were reported?

Observation date Element and reported treatment What the report says
January 24, 2024 Search-bar menu: bubble-style treatment; result-snippet sitelinks: bullets Frank Sandtman spotted the changes and shared them on Mastodon. The bubbles referred to the menu, not the sitelinks. Source
January 3, 2025; updated January 29 Sitelinks: circular arrow buttons beside links Screenshots were spotted by Khushal Bherwani. The update, quoting a post by Sachin Patel, said the buttons were gray and changed to blue on hover; an earlier version was black. This describes buttons, not bubbles around links. Source
July 18, 2025 Sitelinks: light-gray underlines The report said sitelinks normally appeared without underlines. This was a separate styling test. Source

What is known—and what remains unestablished?

These are publisher reports of observed interface tests, not Microsoft announcements. The reports do not establish who saw each variation, its geography or duration, whether any test rolled out permanently, or why the designs were tried. They also provide no evidence of effects on usability, accessibility, clicks, or search performance.

Accordingly, the safest reading is that Bing has been reported with distinct sitelink treatments—bullets, circular arrow buttons, and underlines—while the claimed light-blue bubbles around desktop sitelinks remain uncorroborated in these reports.

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