Bing gets Metro treatment, includes HTML5 live tiles
Microsoft is testing live tiles across its Bing search engine homepage. — The software giant first announced its HTML5 version of Bing at the original beta launch of Internet Explorer 9 in September.
Context & Ripple Effects
Bing has been building toward this since its 2009 relaunch as Microsoft's revamped warhorse against Google, then deepening engagement through verticals like Bing Entertainment's full music streams and TV content in 2010. The HTML5 version of Bing was first announced at the Internet Explorer 9 beta launch last September, so today's Metro-style live tile test is the visible payoff of that browser-tied rebuild.
What makes the experiment notable is the design language rather than the feature itself: live tiles are the signature surface of Windows Phone, and they arrive on bing.com just as Microsoft opens Windows Phone Mango app submissions next month — one visual system spanning phone, browser, and soon Windows itself.
First-order effects
- Bing homepage visitors get tiles that update in place via HTML5, turning a static search box into a live dashboard — and giving Microsoft a public showcase for what Internet Explorer 9's HTML5 engine can render.
Second-order effects
- The move pulls Bing's identity into the Windows Phone orbit ahead of Mango, so Microsoft can market one tile-based interface across its phone and web properties instead of maintaining two design systems.
- Google now fields a homepage contrast: a deliberately spare results page versus Microsoft's portal-like live surface, sharpening the differentiation both companies have been staking out.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, search homepages stop being entry points and start being application surfaces — HTML5 letting Microsoft ship the same UI components across browsers and devices, with the search engine as the connective tissue of the ecosystem.
The trend: Search front pages are evolving from static query boxes into app-like HTML5 dashboards, with Microsoft using Bing to unify the Metro design language across its platforms.