Boolean search
Utilizes special words or symbols to limit, widen, or define the scope of your search.
These include: AND, OR, NOT, and NEAR, as well as the symbols + (add) – (subtract) ” ” (quote).
| Boolean Operator | Symbol | Explanation | Example |
| AND | + | All words must be present in the results | football AND nfl |
| OR | Results can include any of the words | paleo OR primal | |
| NOT | – | Results include everything but the term that follows the operator | diet NOT vegan |
| NEAR | The search terms must appear within a certain number of words of each other | swedish NEAR minister |
- Boolean operators need to be in all uppercase letters for the search engine to understand them as an operator and not a regular word.
- Most search engines default to the OR Boolean operator, meaning it will search for any word, but not necessarily all of them.
- Not all search engines support these Boolean operators. For example, Google understands – but doesn’t support NOT.
Boolean Search Examples
AND
free AND games - Helps find free games by including both words.
"video chat app" iOS AND Windows - Searches for video chat apps that can run on both Windows and iOS devices.
OR
"open houses" saturday OR sunday - Locate open houses that are open either day.
"best web browser" macOS OR Mac - If you're not sure how the article might be worded, you can try a search like this to cover both words.
NOT
2019 movies -comedy - Finds movies mentioning 2019, but excludes all pages that have the word comedy.
"paleo recipes" -sugar - Locates web pages about paleo recipes but ensures that none of them include the word sugar
Google Advanced Searching
Google Image – Dedicated image search page
Common search techniques
Search social media
Put @ in front of a word to search social media. For example: @twitter.
Search for a price
Put $ in front of a number. For example: camera $400.
Search hashtags
Put # in front of a word. For example: #throwbackthursday
Exclude words from your search
Put - in front of a word you want to leave out. For example, jaguar speed -car
Search for an exact match
Put a word or phrase inside quotes. For example, "tallest building".
Search within a range of numbers
Put .. between two numbers. For example, camera $50..$100.
Combine searches
Put “OR” between each search query. For example, marathon OR race.
Search for a specific site
Put “site:” in front of a site or domain. For example, site:youtube.com or site:.gov.
Search for related sites
Put “related:” in front of a web address you already know. For example, related:time.com.
See Google’s cached version of a site
Put “cache:” in front of the site address.
Important: Not all search operators return exhaustive results.
Bing Advanced Searching
Reverse Image Search on Bing
Select the camera button at the right side of the search field > give it a URL to an online image, or upload a photo.
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After running the search using an image, you can find others that look like yours, locate related searches, and more.
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Bing’s Advanced Video Search Options
There are several advanced search options when looking for videos on Bing. They’re stored in a hidden toolbar that’s only visible after selecting Filter.
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There are also a date, length and resolution filters to narrow your scope.
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Symbols to Streamline Your Search
These Bing search modifiers are other ways to get better results when searching for things:
| Bing Advanced Search Options | ||
|---|---|---|
| Symbol | Example | What It Does |
| + | +lifewire +help | Finds web pages that contain all the terms preceded by the + symbol |
| ” “ | “contact us” | Finds the exact words in a phrase |
| () | site:lifewire.com -(iPod tablet) | Finds or excludes web pages that contain a group of words |
| AND, & | house AND sale | Finds web pages that contain all the terms or phrases (this is how normal searches work by default, and it’s an example of a Boolean search) |
| NOT, – | lifewire -buy | Excludes web pages that contain a term or phrase |
| OR, | | iPod OR iPhone | Finds web pages that contain either of the terms or phrases |
Advanced Bing Search Operators
The following are other search tips you can use to narrow down the results on Bing:
| Bing Advanced Search Terms | ||
|---|---|---|
| Keyword | Example | What It Does |
| contains: | tennis contains:gif | Keeps results focused on sites that have links to the file types that you specify |
| ext: | example resume ext:docx | Returns only web pages with the file extension that you specify |
| filetype: | filetype:pdf | Returns only web pages created in the file type that you specify |
| inanchor:, inbody:, intitle: | intitle:2019 inbody:wimbledon | Returns only web pages that contain the specified term in the metadata |
| ip: | ip:207.241.148.80 | Finds sites that are hosted by a specific IP address |
| language: | tennis language:fr | Returns only web pages for a certain language (requires the language code) |
| loc:, location: | loc:US | Returns only web pages from a specific country/region. To focus on two or more, use a logical OR to group them (requires the country or region code) |
| prefer: | tennis prefer:history | Adds emphasis to a search term or another operator to help focus the results |
| site: | site:lifewire.com iPhone | Returns web pages that belong to a specific website. Also works for TLDs (such as site:edu) |
| feed: | feed:technology | Finds RSS or Atom feeds about the search term |
| hasfeed: | site:cnn.com hasfeed:world | Finds web pages that contain an RSS or Atom feed on a website for the terms you search for |
| url: | url:lifewire.com | Checks whether the domain or URL is in the Bing index |