Many articles have been written on hacks, tips, etc over the number of ways and things that can be found using Google’s search platform. Just today I ran into an excellent post on lifehacker listing the Top 10 Obscure Google Search Tricks. The user response was immense and also full of tips that were not included in the original article. In an attempt to list most of these ‘tips’ I’ve compiled a list of the most obscure ones to use at your leisure.
If you think of some that I’ve missed on this post please fee free to comment and I’ll add it to the list.
Trick #1 – Track your UPS packages without having to log on, etc, just input the tracking number in the search field.
Trick #2 – If you’re looking for reviews on a product and don’t care to get bombarded with web results of sites trying to sell you the specific product, type "product name" sucks, in my case below I turned up some reviews for my camera.
Trick #3 – Check your local weather by inputting weather "your zip code" in the search box
Trick #4
– Want to know the time in another country/city anywhere in the world? Type time "city" and it should display the current time in that part of the world.
Trick #5
– Want to check the movie times at your local theater? Type "movie title" "your zip code"
Trick #6 – Want to get a copy of an book electronically? Well, type "title of book" filetype:pdf
Trick #7 – Get the album cover and song list for pretty much any CD by typing "name of artist/band" "title of album"
More tricks below…
Trick #8 – If you’re in the market for rental property, before your hit Craig List type in rent "zip code" and view the listings on Google Maps
Trick #9 – New in town? Looking to rent a car?
Type car "zip code"
Trick #10 – What’s the mass of planet earth? Type mass of the earth
Trick #10 – What’s the mass of our moon? Type mass of the moon
Trick #11 – Want to find out how tall movie stars and other celebrities are, type their name followed by height – i.e. katie holmes height
Article posted on 01 21st, 2008
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Fantastic article – I like the weather option although it is quite frightening how much data google does have. I think it is okay in this regards but when it comes to searching social networking sites and peoples personal details it is quite worrying. Especially since, considering google is moving into this field and their primarily business is “search”. Great article, have a lovely day! – Sue x
This is pretty good.
Thanks, I did not know any of these and it is helpful rather than typing the same thing twice for instance the UPS tracking.
Like it.
Cathy
Shameless self-promotion here, but another way to avoid all the price comparison sites when looking for products is to use http://www.givemebackmygoogle.com for searching. Doesn’t always work, but cuts out a lot of the rubbish.
Thanks for the tips!
Nice list! You can also use something like “4 tablespoons = ? cups” w/o the ” to get conversions.
@JD – You are correct. Thank you for pointing it out.
Need exact names or something like that? Try “joe smuck” and you get all listings for joe smuck. Do joe smuck without quotes and get all listings for joe and all listings for smuck and very few with joe smuck together. You can do that with alot of things when searching
@Eric Jackson – Thanks for the tip!