How does Google search work — operation principles

Have you ever wondered how Google works? Want to know the operation principles of the search engine to understand how to run an online search in the most effective way? Of course, in the process of organizing search results (SERP), a complex algorithm based on many variables is involved. To optimize your use of Google and help you get the most accurate results, we have decided to explain to you the principle of operation of the world’s most popular search engine.

Basic Search Principles

Google is a search engine where you can find just everything. Its database is full of different information, and search algorithms are developed in a way to get the data that we strive to find. But it often turns out that you spend much more time searching for the right information than you expected. Why does it happen, and how does the search engine process our request? If you wonder how to find data easy and fast in Google, then it is time for you to know about Google Search Operators, which are intended to make your online search more accurate and effective.

There is nothing too complicated about the Google operation for those who know how to make use of search operators. The ubiquitous search “spiders” crawl web pages as well as content and links they host. Such a network scanning approach allows Google to index more than 100 million gigabytes of information. However, data indexing is not the only thing Google does. The search engine analyzes different types of online data and matches them based on user search criteria and requests. According to Moz Pro, the main principle of Google operation is associated with crawling, indexing, and ranking.

Data Processing Algorithms

For users to get the best results, Google is constantly perfecting their data processing patterns. Here is a shortlist of the main areas of their ongoing work:

• Data spellcheck;
• Autofill;
• Synonym search;
• Analysis and a general understanding of user requests;
• Google live search;
• Search patterns.

Before providing you with search results based on your request, Google processes more than 200 requests. For instance:

• How many times does a key expression appear on a page?
• Keyword entry in page metadata or URL?
• Does the page contain synonyms for the key expression?
• What is the Google PageRank of a page?

All this happens in less than a second. As a result, you get a list of online resources whose content is the most relevant for you. Apart from content relevance, the search engine also takes into account the trust rate of an online resource and content quality.

Result Processing

The so-called Knowledge Graph is a technology that produces results based on a global database of real people, places, and the connections between those. For example, in addition to the researched data on a particular topic, you will also get a maximum of interesting content (text/ photo/ video) associated with the theme.

The convenience of search results is also added by snippets — small pieces of information that allow you to quickly understand if a webpage matches your request without having to click on a link.

Other Google Search Tools

The search engine is constantly developing its work to ensure the best user experience. That’s why they offer different search tools that you can use. Here are some of them:

• Voice Search — Just click on the microphone icon and tell the search engine what data you are looking for;
• Images — After entering a search query into the search box, Google displays thumbnails based on output results;
• Answers — The search engine allows you to ask specific questions and get quick answers to them;
• Video — Google owns the second most popular search engine in the world — YouTube. That’s why by entering a search request and clicking on the “Videos” icon below the search box, you will get video content relevant to your search query.

With Google, you will not have to enter the same request multiple times. The solution has the same search view for different types of data you may need to find.

Final Say!

What has made Google such a successful search engine? Although many complex processes occur unnoticed by the user, Google is a simple and convenient search engine when it comes to user experience. Whatever question you ask or request you submit, the search engine will process a query and get relevant search results in less than a second.

Have any thoughts on this? Let us know down below in the comments or carry the discussion over to our Twitter or Facebook.

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