Question: I like the new notification version of the review icon, which I'm guessing is still undergoing A/B testing:

![Red dot icon](https://i.stack.imgur.com/lLaIN.jpg)

It does a better job at saying "attention here, please" than the old icon which was almost indiscernible, and certainly easily ignored.

What it doesn't do is tell me any useful information behind the alert. It's obvious that [Shog's request](https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/350836/please-change-the-review-icon-back-to-a-text-link) is not being implemented (yet), but I'm curious about the logic behind this new look.

Does the red icon light up via the same logic as before? E.g. when the review queues [haven't been visited in an hour](https://meta.stackoverflow.com/a/353844/2756409). Or does it light up when a particular queue is full to a certain threshold? I ask because only some of the queues have red dots next to them in the new dropdown style.

Also, if I have used up all my reviews in total, or for a given queue, will the red dot still appear for me if I have not visited the queues in a while? It would be a bit annoying to see a red dot for the CV queue if I have done 40 reviews already.

Answer: 
> 
> Or does it light up when a particular queue is full to a certain threshold?
> 
> 
> 

This. ~~Currently the thresholds are based on 90% of the max hourly value over the past couple weeks~~ (test is done, thresholds now aspirational - see below); we'll adjust those based on the initial test results in an effort to determine if that'll help with prioritization and, uh, indicator blindness.

Kudos to the many people who suggested something like this in response to my previous thread on the matter; if it doesn't work I'm holding you all personally responsible.

September 11, 2017 - test is successful, new UI is live for everyone
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The results over nearly a month of testing were pretty conclusive: the new indicator draws more people to click the button *and* to click through to specific queues once the drop-down is displayed. But don't believe me - believe this screenshot of our funky internal testing tool!

[![about 18% more clicks to the button, with another 8% more clicks to items in the list](https://i.stack.imgur.com/zN7aB.png)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/zN7aB.png)

The BIG win here is that we can now direct folks to specific queues that need more attention - things like Suggested Edits or Low Quality. With the test at an end, I've gone and altered the thresholds to make it much more likely that those two queues will light up promptly (while hopefully keeping them high enough that folks don't end up disappointed when too many reviewers hit the queue at once). Current "danger zone" thresholds (subject to change without notice) are:

* Low Quality, First Posts & Late Answers: 90 tasks
* Suggested Edits: 90 tasks
* Triage: 100 tasks
* Reopen and Help/Improvement: 150 tasks
* Close: 10000 tasks

Thanks again to everyone who suggested this, and especially those who patiently suffered with seemingly-random UI changes while the test was underway.
Just in case anyone decides that the lack of any useful information behind the alert is enough of a reason to want to hide the redness altogether, @Glorfindel made a nice little script that hides exactly that part of the CSS [over here](https://meta.stackoverflow.com/a/358157/1338280).

Of course, at some point your wishes may be granted in a more constructive fashion - so be sure to disable it now and then so you don't miss any improvements.