Google Webmaster Tools Rebrand + A Look Back

Over the years, Google Webmaster Tools has become more and more popular amongst website owners and search engine experts. Slowly but surely Google has rolled out new features since their first attempt at making a place where sitemaps could be submitted. Now, almost 10 years later, Google has collected a huge amount of information from all its users and has realised that there are all sorts of users who appreciate the software and to be inclusive they're renaming it to Google Search Console.

John Mueller, who works at Google said, "I remember ... back when Google Webmaster Tools first launched as a way of submitting sitemap files. It's had an awesome run, the teams have brought it a long way over the years. It turns out that the traditional idea of the “webmaster” reflects only some of you. We have all kinds of Webmaster Tools fans: hobbyists, small business owners, SEO experts, marketers, programmers, designers, app developers, and, of course, webmasters as well. So, to make sure that our product includes everyone who cares about Search, we've decided to rebrand Google Webmaster Tools as Google Search Console ." Having a look around, we managed to track down some screenshots of Google Webmaster Tools over the years: 2008