India Popular

A web search engine is designed to search for information on the World Wide Web. The search results are usually presented in a list of results and are commonly called hits or SERP (Search Engine Rank Page). The results consist of pre-indexed web pages, images, information and files.

Some search engines also index data available in databases or open directories. Unlike Web directories, which are maintained by human editors, search engines operate algorithmically or are a mixture of algorithmic and human input.

A web search engine operates, in the following order

1. Web Crawling : A Web crawler is a computer program that browses websites in a methodical, automated manner. Other terms for Web crawlers are automated browsers like indexers, bots, and worms or Web robots which crawl websites and index them in proper categories.
2. Indexing : After the crawlers have visited the website, based on its content it is labeled (indexed) for the type of keywords it is relevant to. Although there are several factors involved but the basic idea is if a website is about gardening, then it will show up in the SERPs of gardening related keywords.
3. Searching : A web search query is a set of keywords or phrases that a user enters into web search engine to find some information. Web search queries are distinctive in that they are unstructured and often ambiguous, but basically rely on query language calls from the Search engine’s database which has info. about pre-indexed websites (after crawling).

Web search engines work by storing information about many web pages, which they retrieve from the html source itself. These pages are retrieved by a Web crawler (sometimes also known as a spider) — like an automated web browser which follows almost every link on the site.

Tip : Popular Web Sites and Most Visited Places on Internet

3 Widely Used and Most Popular Web Search Engines

#1. GOOGLE

Google Inc. is a multinational public cloud computing and Internet web search technologies corporation. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program. The company was founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while the two were attending Stanford University as Ph.D. candidates and primarily started as a simple web search engine.

"Google" has now become a verb which means to find information using web search. And google now offers all types of popular web applications and services, and now they are taking over social media, mobile dev, health, broadband internet etc. So much, that conspiracy theorists are targeting this internet giant as "the evil one" taking over our online lives.

#2. BING

Bing (formerly Live Search, Windows Live Search, and MSN Search) is the current web search engine (advertised as a "decision engine") from Microsoft. Although nowhere near google in services and web search engine market share, Bing still has some interesting web search engine features which google lacks.

#3. YAHOO

Yahoo! Inc. is an American public corporation (in Silicon Valley), that provides Internet web services worldwide. The company is perhaps best known for its web portal, popular web search engine (Yahoo! Search), Yahoo! Directory, Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! News, advertising, online mapping (Yahoo! Maps), video & photo sharing (Yahoo! Video), and social media websites and services.

Also Read : How to Find the Most Popular Web Searches