The 5 Most Advanced Search Engines On The Web

Search engines

are internet encyclopedias that

allow us to find and filter out relevant information. With any given se

arc

h engine, it takes some skill to find exactly what you are looking for

. You must understand how the search engine works and how your search q

ueries are interpreted.

More adv

anced search engines will meet you halfway, by providing forms for advanced s

earches, better interpretin

g your queries, suggesting keywords, or f

inding unusual conte

xt.

In this artic

le I introduce f

ive search engines with such advanced features.

Google

Why?

• keeps setting new standards.
• comprehensive, yet easy to use interface.
• excellent search term suggestions.

Further reading:

• Master the Google Operands – Search Like a God & Save Time by Tina
• 3 Google Tricks When You Don’t Know What to Search For by Ann
• A Quick Guide To Google’s New Search Features by Eyal

Alternative: Ya

hoo! because it u

ses a different search engine algorit

hm and may give less biased results, as

discussed in a previous article

.

Reverse Image Search

While most ge

neral search engines can search for images ba

sed on file names or tags, more advanc

ed search engines ca

n read the image and make its content

searchable.

TinEye

Why?

• creates an image fingerprint.
• does reverse image search based on the fingerprint.
• reveals where and how images are used.

Alternative: RevIMG, which offers more features, for example selecting an area of the image to be searched. Unfortunately, the datab

ase is limited.

Similar Image Search

Similar image search doesn’t recognize exact copies of a given image, but similar features, such as color, texture, or structures within the image.

GazoPa

Why?

• extracts general image characteristics, such as color and shape.
• searches similar images based on their general characteristics.
• works with uploaded images and image URLs.

Alternative: Google Similar Images, although it only works with images that have already been indexed.

Further reading:

• 10 Tips to Have Fun Using Advanced Google Search for Images by Saikat
• 3 Fascinating Search Engines That Search For Faces by Tina
• Top 5 Black & White Image Search Engines by Ann

Invisible Search

Information that is stored in databases is largely invisible to standard search engines because they merely index the contents of websites, following one link after the next. Invisible search engines specialize in hidden data in the so-called Deep Web.

CompletePlanet

Why?

• access dynamic databases.
• search within data range.
• well-documented help section.

Alternative: Saikat documented 9 more search engines in his article 10 Search Engines to Explore the Invisible Web.

Semantic Search

Semantic search is concerned with the exact meaning of a search term, its definition and the search context. Search engines based on semantic search algorithms are thus better at eliminating irrelevant results.

DuckDuckgo

Why?

• choose intended meaning for ambiguous terms.
• save a myriad of personal settings.
• search other search engines from DuckDuckGo using its !bang feature.

Further reading:

• Top 7 Semantic Search Engines As An Alternative To Google by Nancy

Alternative: hakia because it offers a more compact interface and it lists search results by category.

Apart from the ones mentioned above, there are countless specialty search engines out there. We have profiled many more of them on MakeUseOf:

• 13 Alternative Search Engines That Find What Google Can’t by Kabir
• The Top 5 Google Alternatives and Why You Should Use Them by Dean
• 5 Good Image Search Engines Apart From Google Image Search by Saikat
• 4 Awesome Visual Search Engines to Transform Your Search by Mahendra
• 5 Powerful Ways To Google People From Alternative Search Engines by Mahendra

What advanced search engine do you recommend?