Google search basics

Google indexed entire web pages instead of just titles and descriptions. That’s the reason you can do comprehensive searches based upon key (query) words.

Google’s Boolean default is the AND operator. That means if you enter words without modifiers, Google will search for all of them.

Examples:

  • nissan gtr r34: Google will search for all the words.

  • nissan OR gtr OR r34: This specifies that either word is acceptable.

  • nissan (gtr OR r34): This specifies that you can have:
    • nissan gtr
    • nissan r34
    • but never nissan gtr r34 nor gtr r34

  • nissan (gtr | r34): The same as the last one, using | instead of OR.

  • nissan gtr -r34: This will search for everything that has nissan gtr but does not have r34.

Google syntax words

Google has a special syntax that allows the user to do more specific searches. Some of the possible modifiers that you can use are:

  • Site: Allows to search either a site or a top-level domain (TLD). Example: nissan gtr r34 site:'forocoches', nissan gtr r34 site:'es'

  • Intitle: This searches for the keywords in the title of the web pages. Example: nissan gtr r34 intitle:'cars'

  • Inurl: This restricts your search to the URLs of the web pages. Example: nissan gtr r34 inurl: cars

  • Intext: This searches only on the body of the text (ignores title, url and links). Example: nissan gtr r34 intext:'good condition'

  • Inanchor: Searches for text in a page’s link anchors. Example: nissan gtr r34 inanchor:'forocoches'

  • Link: Returns a list of pages linking to the specified URL: Example: nissan gtr r34 link:'forocoches.es'

  • Cache: Finds a copy of the page that Google indexed even if that page is no longer available. Example: nissan gtr r34 cache:'forocoches.es'

  • Filetype: Searches the extensions. Example: nissan gtr r34 filetype:'png'

  • Related: Finds pages that are related to the specified page. Good way to find categories of pages. Example: nissan gtr r34 related:'forocoches.es'

  • Info: Page of links to more information about the specified URL. Example: nissan gtr r34 info:'forocoches.es' phonebook: Looks up phone numbers. Example: nissan gtr r34 phonebook:'Jon Doe CA'