Search Tips

Make the most of your Google University search with these tips!

Important stuff to remember

Google looks for phrases, then adjacencies, then weights
Google's boolean default is AND
Three ways to do an OR search.
1. Type OR between your keywords ("OR" should always be in call caps)
2. Put your OR statements in parentheses
3. Use the | ("pipe") character in place of the word OR
Google is NOT case sensitive
Google has a hard limit of 10 keywords
Google ignores stop words
a, about, an, and, are, as, at, be , by, from, how, I, in, is, it, of, on, or, that, the, this, to, we, what, when, where, which, with
You can force Google to search for a stop word by placing a + in front of it
pirates +of +the carribean
Google does support whole-word wildcards (*)
The order of your keywords matters

Query Modifiers

daterange: start-stop
pirates daterange:2452401-2452766

inurl: terms
pirates - inurl:disney

filetype: extension
pirates -filetype:pdf

site: domain
You use site:inconjunction with another search term or phrase. pirates site:disney.com
You can also use site: to exclude sites.
pirates - site:disney.com
You can use site: to exclude or include entire domains
pirates - site:domain

inanchor: terms
pirates - inanchor:"disney.com"

intext: terms
pirates +intext:"walt disney"

intitle: terms
pirates +intitle:"walt disney"

Alternate Query Types

cache: URL
cache:disney.com

related: URL
related:disney.com

link: URL
link:disney.com

info: URL
info:disney.com

Other Information Needs

phonebook: data
phonebook:disneyland ca
phonebook: (714) 956-6425

define: term(s)
define: pirate

stocks: symbol1 symbol2
stocks: msft
stocks aapl intc msft macr