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How To Search Google Like A Pro

The document provides 11 search tricks for using Google more effectively. It describes using quotation marks to search for exact phrases or words, the minus sign to exclude words, and the site: operator to search within a specific site. Other tricks covered include using tildes for related words, wildcards, time ranges, file types, the OR operator, defining words, using Google as a calculator, and unit conversions.

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Jacques Giard
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180 views6 pages

How To Search Google Like A Pro

The document provides 11 search tricks for using Google more effectively. It describes using quotation marks to search for exact phrases or words, the minus sign to exclude words, and the site: operator to search within a specific site. Other tricks covered include using tildes for related words, wildcards, time ranges, file types, the OR operator, defining words, using Google as a calculator, and unit conversions.

Uploaded by

Jacques Giard
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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How to Search Google Like a Pro

11 Tricks You Have to Know


Google is a powerful tool, but you’re missing out on a lot of that power if you just type
words into it. Master Google and find the best results faster with these search tricks.

Whether you’re an inexperienced user or a seasoned professional, you’ll probably


find at least one search operator you weren’t aware of here. Many of Google’s
search operators aren’t very well-known.

Exact Words and Phrases

One of the most basic and widely known search tricks is using quotation marks to
search for an exact phrase. For example, perform the following search and you’ll
only get pages that contain the word “Hello” followed by the word “World.”

“Hello World”

This same method now works for exact-word queries. For example, if you search for
“mining,” Google will also show pages that contain the words “miners.” Previously,
you’d use a plus sign and search for +mining, but now you have to enclose the word
in quotes:

“mining”
Excluding a Word

The minus sign allows you to specify words that shouldn’t appear in your results. For
example, if you’re looking for pages about Linux distributions that don’t mention
Ubuntu, use the following search:

linux distributions -ubuntu

Site Search

The site: operator allows you to perform a search in a specific site. Let’s say you’re
looking for information on Windows 7 on How-To Geek. You could use the following
search

site:howtogeek.com windows 7

You can also use the site: operator to specify a domain. For example, if you’re
looking for high-quality references, you could use site:.edu to only pull up results
from .edu domains.
Related Words

The tilde (~) operator is the opposite of enclosing a single word in quotes — it
searches for related words, not just the word you type. For example, if you ran the
following search, you’d find search results with words similar to “geek”:

~geek

Apparently, “Linux” is the most similar word to geek, followed by “Greek.” “Nerd”
comes in third. (Hey, no one ever said Google was perfect.)

The Wildcard

The asterisk (*) is a wildcard that can match any word. For example, if you wanted to
see what companies Google has purchased and how much they paid, you could use
this search:

“google purchased * for * dollars”


Time Ranges

A little-known search operator allows you to specify a specific time range. For
example, use the following search to find results about Ubuntu from between 2008
and 2010:

ubuntu 2008..2010

File Type

The filetype: operator lets you search for files of a specific file type. For example, you
could search for only PDF files.

filetype:pdf how to geek


One Word or the Other

The “OR” operator lets you find words that contain one term or another. For
example, using the following search will pull up results that contain either the word
“Ubuntu” or the word “Linux.” The word “OR” must be in uppercase.

ubuntu OR linux

Word Definitions

You don’t have to Google a word and look for a dictionary link if you want to see its
definition. Use the following search trick and you’ll see an inline definition:

define:word
Calculator

Use Google instead of pulling one out or launching a calculator app. Use the +, -, *
and / symbols to specify arithmetic operations. You can also use brackets for more
complicated expressions. Here’s an example:

(4 + 2) * (6 / 3)

Unit Conversions

The calculator can also convert between units. Just type “X [units] in [units]”. Here’s
an example:

5 nautical miles in kilometers

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