What is this box on google search?

[PianoP]

When I type certain words into the google search box in Firefox and Chrome, a little white box appears within the text box (see image). This box doesn't seem to happen when I type the same phrase into text boxes of other websites. Does anyone know what is going on?

Thanks!

 

[rm5]

Funny how I come across this thread after I was just experiencing this!

I have no idea what it is, except mine's a black box, and it actually appears over the letter that I just typed.

 

[Nermal]

I just tested this and got it too. It appears to be part of a scroll bar, and I guess Google's broken something and made some text that doesn't quite fit inside its bounding box.

Safari 16.4.1 on OS 12.6.5.

 

[bogdanw]

Google might be testing some AI functions in the search bar. Some tests may be broken by Safari extensions.
For me, it takes a lot of text for the scroll bar to appear


Safari 16.4.1 (17615.1.26.101.10, 17615) macOS 12.6.5 (21G531)

 

[rm5]

Mine's happening in both Safari (which I never use) and Chrome.

 

[PianoP]

For me it only happens with certain character combinations, so maybe a special character option in development.

I'm pleased others are seeing it as my initial thought was a keylogger.