Frustrated by your Google searches? You’re not alone. While more people use Google than any other search engine on the Web, most do not realize that there is much more to this mammoth search index than meets the eye: an amazing repertoire of specific Google search commands that can help Web searchers find what they’re looking for, fast.
If you’d like to make your Google searches effective every time, these are the basics that you should have in your web search repertoire. These are easy to learn, easy to implement, and you’ll see an instant marked improvement in your Google searches.
Search for a specific phrase
If you want Google to find a specific phrase that has words in a specific order, then you want to use quotation marks.
Quotation marks tell Google to only retrieve Web pages with your words in the exact order and proximity that you typed them, which makes exact searches much more efficient. Learn more about using quotation marks to make your searches more effective.
Find a type of document
Google doesn’t just index Web pages, written primarily in HTML and other markup languages. You can also use Google to find virtually any kind of file format available, including PDF files, Word documents, and Excel spreadsheets.
This can be a very useful tip to know, especially when you’re searching for research information. Learn more about using Google to find particular types of files with one easy search command.
See a website even when it’s down
If a site has been taken down, you can’t see it anymore, right? Not necessarily.
Google’s cache command can retrieve archived versions of most Web sites online, making it easy for you to see a site that has been taken down (for whatever reason), or is under too much traffic from an unexpected event.
Learn more about using Google cache to dig up old versions of pages.
Search for a certain word within a Web address
Looking for specific words within a Web address? Google’s “allinurl” search command retrieves all specified words that appear in the URL of a Web site, and make it easy to find links that have the words you’re looking for in the web address.
If you want to find a specific word and restrict your search only to URLs, you can also use the “inurl” search command to accomplish this.
Learn more about using Google to find words within a URL.
Search within the title of a Web page
Web page titles are found at the top of your Web browser and within search results.
You can restrict your Google search to only Web page titles with the “allintitle” search command. The term allintitle is a search operator specific to Google that brings back search results restricted to search terms found in Web page titles.
For example, if you only wanted search results with the word “tennis championships”, you would use this syntax:
allintitle: tennis championships
This would bring back Google search results with the words “tennis championships” in the Web page titles.
Find information about any Web site
Get an instant snapshot of any Web site with the “info:” command, a unique Google search operator that retrieves a complete set of information.
See sites that link to a specific site
Using “link:URL” (with URL representing your specific Web address), you can see which sites link to any other site.
Find movie information and theater showtimes
Want to go see a movie? Simply type “movies” or “movie” into the Google search field, and Google will retrieve a brief movie summary as well as local theater showtimes.
Get a weather report from anywhere in the world
Simply type the word “weather” plus the city you’re interested in, any city in the world, and Google can retrieve a quick forecast for you.