A search engine is a software program that searches for the specific keywords or queries entered by a user and returns relevant results.
Google, Yahoo!, Bing, YouTube, and DuckDuckGo are some popular examples of search engines.
The process of organizing content in the form of a list is commonly known as a Search Engine Results Page (SERP).
Now Let’s Check How Search Engine Work?
Search Engine works in 4 principles which are –
- Crawling
- Indexing
- Ranking
- Search Result
Crawling
The actual finding of new webpages on the net begins with the process called crawling. Web Crawler is also known as a search engine bot, web robot, or web spider.
Search engines have the web crawlers or spiders to perform crawling, and the task of crawler is to visit a web page, read it, and follow the links to other web pages of the site
Do You Know?
Googlebot is the most popular web crawler.
Indexing
Once the bots crawl the data, it’s time for indexing – the process of validating and storing the content from the webpages in the search engine’s database called “index”. It is basically a big library of all the websites.
Website has to be indexed in order to be displayed on the search engine results page. Keep in mind that both crawling and indexing are continuous processes that take place over and over again to keep the database fresh.
Once the webpage is analyzed and saved in the index, it can be used as a search result for a potential search query.
Ranking
The last step includes picking the best results and creating a list of pages that will appear on the result page.
Every search engine uses dozens of ranking signals and most of them are kept as a secret, unavailable to the public.
What are the Most Popular Search Engines?
In terms of worldwide popularity, Google has been #1 for years. This is the list of top most popular search engines:
Note: More than 70% of worldwide internet users use Google to do their searches.
Note: In January 2018, DuckDuckGo private browser was launched on iOS and Android.
Why is Google the Most Popular Search Engine?
- It was one of the first search engines
- It offers relevant results
- It is fast
- It is constantly improved
- It is connected to several free services
What is the Difference Between Browser and Search Engine?
Web browser (e.g. Chrome, Firefox, Microsoft Edge, etc.) is a software application that is installed on the computer or a smartphone. The purpose of the browser is to provide a user-friendly interface to display the webpages.
Search engine (e.g. Google, Bing, Yahoo!, etc.) is an online tool available on the website that can be accessed through a web browser. The purpose of a search engine is to provide answers to users’ queries in the form of relevant webpages.