Google Search Hacks: Start Googling Like Sherlock

Dominic Tarn Head of Content

28.10.2019

By knowing and applying google search hacks, you’ll feel more comfortable on the web and even make a breakthrough in your job when it comes to research activities.

If asked, you might answer that you are a professional in handling all the opportunities of this search engine. “Of course, I use it every single day!” – you will say. This article will not contradict it, rather I will be a bit hilarious, sowing some doubts about it. Today, I’ll share google tricks 2019 and some eternal techniques that will help you become a pro user and start googling as a real Sherlock:

Operators that help search more efficiently
The collection of google search hacks that increase productivity
Some of google secret tricks to get answers to specific questions
Discover google tricks 2019 for different daily tasks
Raise your mood with these google fun tricks

Are you ready?

Google search hacks to browse more efficiently by using operators

Once, my colleague told me after our team meeting:

“Conducting market research, I googled that question many times and did not find a substantive answer. I was amazed to see that the CEO needed only two minutes to google the answer on the spot. He must have a premium Google account or some super-power, LOL…”

Suggesting a super-power, my colleague was very close to the truth. The whole point was that the CEO had perfect Google user skills and was well-aware of search operators restricting Google results.

Namely:

1. Use quotes to get the results containing the whole phrase

When you put a key phrase into quotes, you ask Google to show websites that contain an exact key phrase. If you do not use quotes, the search engine will show you content that contains the words constituting a key phrase, however, that will be mentioned in random order in the article.

For example, if you google “banana bread recipe” in quotes, you will get websites with the whole phrase inside. On the contrary, using this key phrase without quotes, you see search results that contain phrases like “recipe for banana bread” or something else.

2. Use a hyphen to exclude some search results

To restrict search results, use a hyphen before a keyword that you would like to exclude. Looking for information about Tesla as a scientist, for example, you can exclude search results about a car brand, by putting a hyphen before “cars” in the query “Tesla -cars.”

3. Get information from specific sites using “site:” or “source:”

Put the keywords followed by a search operator “site:<website URL>” or “source:<website URL>” to find information on specific sites. In the example below, you can see that a search query “best songs 2019 site:bbc.com” gives the lists of the best songs of 2019, according to BBC, without mentioning other sources.

google secret tricks

4. Apply “related:<website URL>” to find similar sites

If you need to find alternatives to a site you already know, you can utilize “related:<website URL>”. For instance, to find online shopping platforms similar to Amazon, you need to write “related:amazon.com” and get a list of alternative platforms like walmart.com, ebay.com, overstock.com, etc. It’s a truly indispensable technique for competitive analysis.

5. Use “intext:” and “allintext:” to get results containing a particular key phrase in the text

Utilize operator “intext:<key phrase>” to ask Google to show you websites that contain at least some of the words from a search query. If you need a list of web resources that have a whole key phrase in the text, use “allintext:<key phrase>” as it is given in the example: “allintext: content marketing tools.”

You can apply the same algorithm telling the search engine to show you the websites that have specific keywords in the URL, title, or anchor using the operators such as “inurl,” “allinurl,” “intitle,” “allintitle,” “inanchor,” “allinanchor” respectively.

6. Utilize “definition:” to understand the meaning of specific terms within seconds

Don’t know what “dyslexia” means, for example? Simply put “definition:dyslexia” in the search tab, and Google will immediately show you a snippet with a definition of the term.

7. Get information about the location of an object or a person by using “<keyword> location:”

You can easily find the location of any building or another object, by using operator “<keyword> location:”. Imagine, you have forgotten the country where the architectural masterpiece you like so much is located. Put the name of that place followed by “location:” and get a quick answer to your question.

8. Use “filetype:<suffix>” to specify a needed format

By applying “Chinese Cookbook filetype:pdf” for example, you ask Google to filter search results and show only those that offer Chinese cookbooks in PDF format. It works with all electronic formats accessible on the web.

9. Use an asterisk to find a missing word in a phrase

The asterisk works as a wildcard. If you do not remember the exact name of a song, for instance, you can write the words you know and put the asterisks instead of the words you have forgotten. If you write Nancy Sinatra’s song title like this “Bang * (My Baby * Me Down)” Google will give you results with a full name “Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down).”

10. Apply “OR” and “AND” to include or exclude some information

You can type “<keyword>OR<keyword>” in the search tab to find the websites that contain at least one of the mentioned keywords. If you write “IT Conference in New York 2018 OR 2019” Google will show you websites about the conferences that happened in 2018 or 2019.

Ask Google for quick tips and answers

Google can also understand quick commands and give you instantaneous results showing the information you need at the top of the search page. Below you can see the commands you can enter to get quick answers.

Keep in mind these google search hacks to increase your productivity both at work and in daily life:

Time in <city>g

Typing “Time in <city>” easily checks the current time in a specific location. It is particularly useful for team collaboration, when you need to define the time for a meeting, keeping in mind that all your colleagues are at different places on the planet now. For example, a search query “Time in Toronto” will show you a snippet with local time in Toronto, as you can see it below.

Temperature, Weather & Forecast

Enter “temperature,” “weather,” or “forecast” followed by the name of city or zip code to get the weather forecast in a specific location. Putting “Weather in London,” will see such a snippet with all the information you need:

Timer and Stopwatch

No need to spend time looking for a timer or stopwatch on your smartphone, you can quickly find them on Google and start counting.

Calculator

You can easily solve math problems by using the Google Calculator that has an online keyboard with all possible math operations.

Google Translator

Translate any word or phrase into all languages Google knows. Enter “translate <keyword> into <language>” to see a quick translation at the top of a page with the search results. For instance, you can type “translate smart lighting brand into German” to get the following result.

Package Tracking

Type a tracking number into a search tab to monitor information about your package.

Stock Quotes

Easily track stock quotes on Google. Just enter what you are interested in and get a whole set of information about stock quotes of a particular company.

Appl

Google secret tricks to get answers to specific questions

Ask Google to do the math and it will give you a fast solution at the top of a search page: “5 to the fifth power,” “350*40,” “180/3,” etc.
Use it to solve geometry: “solve rhombus.”
See public data such as unemployment rate USA, for instance.
Retrieve your public IP address
Find specific information about a company: “CEO Johnson & Johnson.”
Get information about the word etymology: “corporation etymology.”
Separate number by two periods to see results that contain numbers in the given range: “dslr $300..$500.”

* Use Google to convert values
Google quickly calculates distance, weight, length, physics values, as well as the exchange rate. To convert one value into another, you can use both “in” and “to” in the search queries like:

5 km in miles
4 Kg to lb
18 Fahrenheit into Celcius
10 usd to euro
120 inch in cm

Google tricks 2019 for different daily tasks

Easily find flight information. Put down the flight number to get actual information about flight delays, check-in, etc. You can also enter “<city>-<city>flights” to find flight tickets and prices (“Rome-Paris flights”).
Ask Google to help you find places like restaurants, hostels, banks nearby. Typing “restaurants near me,” you will get a list of the closest locations marked on Google Maps.
Find “all books by <an author>,” “all songs by <a singer>,” “all movies by “a producer,” etc.
Easily learn what a day of the week will be in 60 days, for example.
Determine any changeable holiday date by entering its name.

It’s time for fun! Google likes it, too

Leo Tolstoy said that, “The Beauty will save the world.” However, we can contradict it saying that “Humor can save the world, too.” Here are some google fun tricks you can enter to raise your mood and switch the attention from work. Type the following key phrases on Google and see what happens:

“Do a barrel roll” – rolling Google page screen.

“Askew” – a page with the search results will be shifted right.

“Google in 1998” – Google page in the old-school style.

“Google sphere” – see a rotated version of Google.com

“Atari breakout” – take a mental break playing the old-school game, putting this key phrase in the image search.

google atari breakou

“The loneliest number” – surely, it is about the number “1” type this key phrase to get plenty of Google results devoted to this topic, including funny songs about the number 1, philosophic discussions, movies, etc.

“Flip a coin” – enter it to decide who is washing dishes today, for example.

“Answer to life, the universe, and everything” – you might be surprised, but it is 42. Yes, I have not misspelled, the number 42 was calculated as the answer to life, the universe, and everything. You can check here how Wikipedia explains it.

google answer to life

Bonus: quick google search hacks and tips

Explore other search apps offered by Google, such as Google Trends, Google Images, Google Scholar, etc.
Use tabs to customize your query in the shopping, image, or video search. For example, you can choose the “Large” size of the image and “Black and White” color in the search settings to get more specific results.
Do not care about misspelling too much. Google will likely understand what you mean, by giving you search results that are very close to a misspelled keyphrase. If you enter “The weathr in Lndon tday” Google will assume that you mean “The weather in London today.”
Usually, Google does not recognize symbols and punctuation. However, there are some exceptions you should know to save time when entering keyphrases in the search box:

“@” – use it to search for social tags

“+” – you can utilize plus when searching for healthcare-related things such as blood type

“&” – apply the ampersand when searching for strongly connected ideas and phrases

“%” – you can use it when searching for percent values

“#” – apply the number sign when searching for trending topics that use hashtags

“-” – you can use a hyphen when searching for words that are strongly connected

Conclusion

In this article, I have overviewed the best google search hacks that will definitely improve your research results. Now you know a great variety of operators and google secret tricks to restrict search results and extract only essential information.

Don’t forget to take a mental break by enjoying the google fun tricks! I hope all the above-mentioned techniques simplify your life, increase your productivity at work and make you the main character of the next Sherlock episode!