Google: hick’s law example to copy

What to steal

Put the common action on one button and the alternative on a second.
Keep the other links, but don’t give them the same size as the main choice.

What to test next: Two buttons under the field vs the same page with extra actions as buttons of the same size. Measure time to the first search.

In plain words

Why it works

Google uses Hick’s law: the time it takes to choose grows with the number of options (Hick 1952). Under the empty search box, the only two buttons are “Google Search” and “I’m Feeling Lucky”. The rest of the capture is smaller links: About and Store at the top left, Gmail, Images and Sign in at the top right, and a footer with Advertising, Business, How Search works, Privacy, Terms and Settings, plus “Build, create, and do more with AI tools from Google”. The choice the page is built around is those two buttons. Whether two buttons make people search faster on Google is not public.

Honest nudge or dark pattern?

Honest nudge

Honest nudge: both actions are labelled, neither is preselected, and the other links stay visible.

Sources: Captured by Nudgeswipe, 4 Nov 2026 (homepage, logged out)

Context

Google homepage, logged out, on 4 Nov 2026. The search field was empty. No query was typed.

The research

The research behind it

● Strong evidence · More on hick’s law, with sources →

Next: run it on your product

Try it on your own product

Opens your assistant with this teardown, our verdict and the steps above. It asks about your product first, then suggests tests you can run.

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You are helping me apply a behavioural-design pattern ethically.

Pattern: Google: Google keeps the search choice to two buttons
Bias: Hick's law: The time it takes to choose grows with the number and complexity of options.
Why it nudges: Google uses Hick's law: the time it takes to choose grows with the number of options (Hick 1952). Under the empty search box, the only two buttons are "Google Search" and "I'm Feeling Lucky". The rest of the capture is smaller links: About and Store at the top left, Gmail, Images and Sign in at the top right, and a footer with Advertising, Business, How Search works, Privacy, Terms and Settings, plus "Build, create, and do more with AI tools from Google". The choice the page is built around is those two buttons. Whether two buttons make people search faster on Google is not public.
Our verdict: Honest nudge. Honest nudge: both actions are labelled, neither is preselected, and the other links stay visible.
Source page: https://nudgeswipe.com/examples/google-two-search-buttons/ (JSON: https://nudgeswipe.com/api/teardowns/google-two-search-buttons.json)

Rules: say a brand "uses" a tactic, never that it "worked"; outcomes are not public unless the company published them; no invented uplift estimates; flag mixed evidence. Honest nudge = true, visible, easy to reverse, and in the user's interest. Dark pattern = hides costs, fakes scarcity or popularity, shames, or makes leaving harder than joining. Quote company-published results as "X reports", with the source link, and don’t generalise them. Don’t cite retracted or failed-to-replicate studies as support (e.g. Ariely & Wertenbroch 2002). Don’t state study figures unless they’re on this page or in a source you can link. If an idea crosses the line, link the matching deceptive.design pattern.

Tasks:
1. Ask me for my product, the flow (URL or screenshots) and the goal.
2. Audit where this pattern already appears, or could, in that flow.
3. Propose 2-3 ethical experiments: hypothesis, variant copy or UI, primary metric, and a guardrail metric (refunds, complaints, cancellations).
4. Flag every dark-pattern risk and say how to stay on the honest side.

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Sources

Our capture of google.com, 4 Nov 2026
Hick (1952), On the Rate of Gain of Information. doi.org/10.1080/17470215208416600
Captured by Nudgeswipe, 4 Nov 2026 (homepage, logged out): google.com

Google keeps the search choice to two buttons

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Why it works

Honest nudge

The research behind it

Try it on your own product

5 new nudges, every Friday