Monday, April 2, 2012

Popular Search Engines in the 90′s: Then and Now

In the heydays of the internet – when Google wasn’t the only search engine people used to seek information on the web – web surfers (I bet you haven’t heard that term in a while) had several options for finding what they needed on the net.


This article harks back to the days of AltaVista, HotBot, and when Ask was still Ask Jeeves. You’ll see how the web designs of ubiquitous search engines of the past have evolved through time. Put your nostalgia hats on as we travel back to the ancient times of the internet!


HotBot


1997


HotBot



1999


HotBot


2009


HotBot


Excite


1996


Excite


1998


Excite


2009


Excite


WebCrawler


1996


WebCrawler


1998


WebCrawler


2009


WebCrawler


Ask Jeeves (now Ask.com)


1999


Ask Jeeves (now Ask.com)


2009


Ask Jeeves (now Ask.com)


Yahoo!


1996


Yahoo!


2009


Yahoo!


The future


Yahoo!


Google


1998


Google


2009


Google


Dogpile


1998


Dogpile


2009


Dogpile


AltaVista


1998


Excite


2009


AltaVista


Lycos


1996


Lycos


1998


1998


2009


2009


MSN Search (now Bing)


1999


MSN Search (now Bing)


2009


MSN Search (now Bing)


AOL Search


1999


AOL Search


2009


2009


Infoseek (now Go.com)


1997


Infoseek (now Go.com)


2009


Infoseek (now Go.com)


Netscape Search


1999


Netscape Search


2009


Netscape Search


MetaCrawler


1996


MetaCrawler


1998


MetaCrawler


2009


MetaCrawler


All the Web


1999


All the Web


2009


All the Web


What was your favorite search engine (before Google)? How did search engines affect you in the early days of the web? Share your thoughts and opinions in the comments.


* Screenshots courtesy of the Internet Archive: Wayback Machine


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About the Author


Jacob Gube is the Founder and Chief Editor of Six Revisions. He’s also a web developer/designer who specializes in distance-learning education, front-end development, and web accessibility. If you’d like to connect with him, head on over to the contact page and follow him on Twitter: @sixrevisions.

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