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.

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search engine British  

noun

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

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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.

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Etymology

Origin of search engine

First recorded in 1990–95

Example Sentences

The money was left in perpetuity by the art philanthropist and founder of the travel search engine Cheap Flights, Hugo Burge, who died in 2023 aged just 51.

From BBC

The company’s Gemini 3 model has put it on top of the heap of performance for AI models, while the unmatched distribution of its search engine and products like Gmail have quickly driven adoption.

From The Wall Street Journal

Google has been working to incorporate AI tools into a number of its products, including its classic search engine.

From The Wall Street Journal

In some ways, this is an evolution of SEO, or search engine optimization—the strategies companies have been using for decades to appear atop Google results.

From The Wall Street Journal

Apple and Google have a separate partnership for search, in which Google effectively provides the search engine capabilities for Apple Safari.

From BBC