Skip to main content

Google Search Operators

Exact Match​

Wrap a phrase in double quotes to search for that exact sequence of words.

"dependency injection in Angular"

Returns only results containing that exact phrase, not pages that merely mention the individual words separately.

Exclude Terms​

Use - directly before a word to exclude results containing that term.

python -snake

Searches for "python" but excludes pages about snakes.

OR Operator​

Use OR (uppercase) between terms to find pages containing either term.

React OR Vue

Wildcard​

Use * as a placeholder for unknown words within an exact-match phrase.

"how to * a REST API"

Use site: to restrict results to a specific domain.

site:developer.mozilla.org flexbox

Can also target a TLD:

site:edu machine learning

File Type​

Use filetype: to find specific file formats.

filetype:pdf network security

Common file types: pdf, docx, xlsx, pptx, csv, xml, json, txt

URL, Title, and Text Filters​

  • inurl: — term must appear in the URL
  • intitle: — term must appear in the page title
  • intext: — term must appear in the body text
  • allinurl:, allintitle:, allintext: — all following terms must appear in the respective location
intitle:cheatsheet javascript
allinurl:api docs v2

Date Range​

Use before: and after: with dates in YYYY-MM-DD format.

"React Server Components" after:2025-01-01
  • related: — find sites similar to a given domain
  • cache: — view Google's cached version of a page
related:stackoverflow.com

Combining Operators​

Operators can be combined for highly targeted searches.

site:github.com filetype:md "contributing guidelines"
"error handling" site:stackoverflow.com -closed after:2024-01-01
intitle:resume filetype:pdf site:edu "computer science"