search engine

American  

[surch en-juhn] / ˈsɜrtʃ ˌɛn dʒən /

noun

Digital Technology.

1. a computer program that searches documents, especially on the World Wide Web, for a specified word or words and provides a list of documents in which they are found.

---

search engine British  

noun

1. computing a service provided on the internet enabling users to search for items of interest

---

search engine Cultural  

1. Web sites or software that search the Internet for documents that contain a key word, phrase, or subject that is specified by the user to the search engine. Each engine has its own method of searching for information.

---

Etymology

Origin of search engine

First recorded in 1990–95

Example Sentences

Other Chinese firms on the list include search engine platform Baidu, electric car marker Nio and aircraft manufacturer Comac.

From BBC • Jun. 9, 2026

The company never created its own search engine, relying on Google to power search across its devices.

From Barron's • Jun. 5, 2026

The search engine and cloud computing company is expected to spend the money raised on building data centers that feature its own custom chips, which Broadcom helps design.

From Barron's • Jun. 2, 2026

China has Huawei, Tencent, ByteDance, BYD, DJI and CATL, it argued; America has produced little besides “a search engine that’s a bit chattier than the old ones, running on Taiwan-fab’d chips.”

From The Wall Street Journal • May 26, 2026

Her hair still smelled like french fries from the restaurant, and she tied it back as she opened her search engine.

From "Far from the Tree" by Robin Benway