Using the site: command
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Friday, March 02, 2007
The site: command enables you to search through a particular site. For instance, a
searcher could look for references to Buffy in this blog by doing the
following search:
site:googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com buffy
Webmasters sometimes use this command to see a list of indexed pages for a site, like this:
site:www.google.com
Note that with this command, there's no space between the colon and the URL. A search for
www.site.com returns URLs that begin with www and a search for site.com returns URLs for all
subdomains. (So,
site:google.com
returns URLs such as www.google.com, checkout.google.com, and finance.google.com). You can do this
search from Google or you can go to your Webmaster Tools account and use the link under
Statistics > Index stats. Note that whether this link
includes the www depends on how you have added the site to your account.
Historically, Google has avoided showing pages that appear to be duplicate (for example, pages
with the same title and description) in search results. Our goal is to provide useful results to
the searcher. However, with a site: command, searchers are likely looking for a full
list of results from that site, so we are making a change to do that. In some cases, a
site: search doesn't show a full list of results even when the pages are different,
and we are resolving that issue as well. Note that this is a display issue only and doesn't in any
way affect search rankings. If you see this behavior, simply click the "repeat the search with
omitted results included" link to see the full list. The pages that initially don't display
continue to show up for regular queries. The display issue affects only a site:
search with no associated query. In addition, this display issue is unrelated to supplemental
results. Any pages in supplemental results display "Supplemental Result" beside the URL.
Because this change to show all results for site: queries doesn't affect search
rankings at all, it will probably happen in the normal course of events as we merge this change
into the next time that we push a new executable for handling the site: command. As a
result, it may be several weeks or so before you start to see this change, but we'll keep
monitoring it to make sure the change goes out.
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[null,null,[],[[["\u003cp\u003eThe \u003ccode\u003esite:\u003c/code\u003e command allows users to search within a specific website, like searching for "buffy" within a blog.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eUsing \u003ccode\u003esite:\u003c/code\u003e with just a domain (e.g., \u003ccode\u003esite:google.com\u003c/code\u003e) returns results from all subdomains, not just the main one.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eGoogle is updating the \u003ccode\u003esite:\u003c/code\u003e command to show more comprehensive results, including what were previously considered "duplicate" pages, to give a complete view of a site's content.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThis change only affects how results are displayed for \u003ccode\u003esite:\u003c/code\u003e searches and has no impact on a site's overall search ranking or how it appears in regular search results.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThe update to the \u003ccode\u003esite:\u003c/code\u003e command will be gradually rolled out over the next few weeks.\u003c/p\u003e\n"]]],["The `site:` command in Google allows users to search within a specific website or view its indexed pages. When using this command, there should be no space between the colon and the URL. Google is updating the `site:` search results to display a full list of pages from a site, even those that were previously omitted due to being duplicates, or for other reasons. This change is a display update and doesn't affect search rankings. Users can view omitted results by clicking a designated link.\n"],null,["# Using the site: command\n\nFriday, March 02, 2007\n\n\nThe `site:` command enables you to search through a particular site. For instance, a\nsearcher could look for references to Buffy in this blog by doing the\nfollowing search:\n[`site:googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com buffy`](https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Agooglewebmastercentral.blogspot.com+buffy)\n\n\nWebmasters sometimes use this command to see a list of indexed pages for a site, like this:\n[`site:www.google.com`](https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Awww.google.com)\n\n\nNote that with this command, there's no space between the colon and the URL. A search for\nwww.site.com returns URLs that begin with www and a search for site.com returns URLs for all\nsubdomains. (So,\n[`site:google.com`](https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Agoogle.com)\nreturns URLs such as www.google.com, checkout.google.com, and finance.google.com). You can do this\nsearch from Google or you can go to your Webmaster Tools account and use the link under\nStatistics \\\u003e Index stats. Note that whether this link\nincludes the www depends on how you have added the site to your account.\n\n\nHistorically, Google has avoided showing pages that appear to be duplicate (for example, pages\nwith the same title and description) in search results. Our goal is to provide useful results to\nthe searcher. However, with a `site:` command, searchers are likely looking for a full\nlist of results from that site, so we are making a change to do that. In some cases, a\n`site:` search doesn't show a full list of results even when the pages are different,\nand we are resolving that issue as well. Note that this is a display issue only and doesn't in any\nway affect search rankings. If you see this behavior, simply click the \"repeat the search with\nomitted results included\" link to see the full list. The pages that initially don't display\ncontinue to show up for regular queries. The display issue affects only a `site:`\nsearch with no associated query. In addition, this display issue is unrelated to supplemental\nresults. Any pages in supplemental results display \"Supplemental Result\" beside the URL.\n\n\nBecause this change to show all results for `site:` queries doesn't affect search\nrankings at all, it will probably happen in the normal course of events as we merge this change\ninto the next time that we push a new executable for handling the `site:` command. As a\nresult, it may be several weeks or so before you start to see this change, but we'll keep\nmonitoring it to make sure the change goes out."]]
