search engine

American  

[surch en-juhn] / ˈsɜrtʃ ˌɛn dʒən /

noun

Digital Technology.

• search engines
  plural

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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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• search engines
  plural

Etymology

Origin of search engine

First recorded in 1990–95

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

search engine

The Stanford University coders behind the search engine, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, had initially called their project Backrub before renaming it Google—a play on googol, meaning one followed by 100 zeros.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 15, 2026

The Beijing-based search engine provider, sometimes called China's Google, has for years heralded the potential of AI in the country.

From Barron's ● Aug. 18, 2026

“Google would argue that the search engine is in many ways the way people are accessing the language model and Gemini, right?”

From MarketWatch ● Aug. 15, 2026

The European Parliament just switched its default search provider to a French service, called Qwant, to reduce reliance on American technology — but the search engine turns to Microsoft Bing for much of its results.

From MarketWatch ● Aug. 5, 2026

Angie took one last look at the search results, then reluctantly closed down the search engine.

From "The Vanderbeekers of 141st Street" by Karina Yan Glaser