The refresh also introduces topic-specific alternatives to its news feed. One consequence of the change is that adverts can take up more screen space, making them harder to ignore.
However, the project's lead engineer denied ads were the redesign's focus. He also played down suggestions that the move was intended to make people spend more time on the site.
Chris Struhar instead suggested his focus had been on stripping back the amount of information being shown on the news feed to make each post more "engaging".
"I often compare this to a 1960s television with wood panelling, knobs around it and a tiny postage stamp-sized screen - and what we're trying to do is take that same TV and translate it into a 40in HD experience."
Facebook reported in January that 1.06 billion people were using its service at least once a month. It also revealed that its profit for the last three months of 2012 was 79% down on the same period the previous year despite a rise in sales because of increased spending on research and development.
Source: BBC News
