New to Google? Learn the Basics
Basic Search
To enter a query into Google, just type in a few descriptive words and hit the 'enter' key (or click on the Google Search button) for your list of relevant results.
Google only searches for pages that exactly match your search terms, so you can try using different versions of your search terms. For example, if a search for "Boston hotel" didn't turn up what you were looking for, try "Boston hotels" instead.
Or you might try rephrasing your query. For example, searches on "cheap plane tickets" and "cheap airline tickets" return different sets of results.
Automatic "and" Queries
Google automatically adds "and" between the words you enter so it only returns those pages that include all of your search terms. To restrict a search further, just include more terms. Google also prefers pages in which related query terms are near each other.
For example, to plan a vacation to Hawaii, simply type
into the search field and click on Google Search.
Using the Google directory
The Google directory provides yet another way to find quality information on the web. Get answers about how the Google directory works by visiting the directory help page.
Search - Frequently Asked Questions
How can I narrow my search results?
Sometimes a search is in the right area but gives too many results. To reduce the number of search results, you might want to do a new search that only "looks" within the URLs returned by your first search query. This is often called "narrowing a search" or "searching within the current search results."
Google makes this process easy. Since Google only returns web pages that contain all the words in your query, all you need to do is add more query words to the terms you have already entered. This new query will return a specific subset of the pages returned by your original "too-broad" query.
You can also exclude a word by putting a minus sign ("-") immediately in front of the term you want to avoid. (Be sure to include a space before the minus sign.)
Does it help to use "or" or "and"?
Google automatically does an "and" search for all query terms. Google does not support the logical "or" operator. Some search engines return pages that contain only a few of the query terms you enter, even giving them preference to pages that contain all the terms. Google only returns pages that contain all the terms.
Because Google does not support "or" searches, there is no way to tell Google to accept pages containing either word A or word B. You can submit the query twice, once with word A and once with word B if you don't find your desired result the first time.
Do I need to type the whole word?
To provide the most accurate results, Google does not use "stemming" or support the "wildcard" searches. In other words, Google searches for exactly the words that you enter in the search box. Searching for "googl" or "googl*" will not yield "googler" or "googlin." If in doubt, try both forms: "airline" and "airlines," for instance.
Do capital letters matter?
Google searches are not case sensitive. All letters, regardless of how you type them, will be understood as lower case. For example, searches for "george washington", "George Washington", and "gEoRgE wAsHiNgToN" will all return the same results.
