or Googling; googles or Googles
Leah Greenblatt
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Google vs. Googol
The verb google and the noun googol are commonly confused because they have similar pronunciations. Google is the word that is more common to us now, and so it is sometimes mistakenly used as a noun to refer to the number 10100. That number is a googol, so named by Milton Sirotta, the nephew of the American mathematician Edward Kasner, who was working with large numbers like 10100. Google, on the other hand, is the name of a search engine as well as a verb that refers to searching the Internet using the Google search engine. (The search engine’s name was inspired by the number: the founders of Google chose the name to reflect their mission “to organize a seemingly infinite amount of information on the web.”) You can remember that the number is spelled googol by remembering that a googol has lots of o’s.
Two related words, googolplex and googleplex, are also commonly confused. A googolplex is the number 1 followed by a googol of zeros; the Googleplex is the Mountain View, California headquarters of Google.
Examples of google in a Sentence
Cynthia Ozick, Harper's, April 2007
The Sports Gal and I delayed dinner plans so I could analyze the replays like a police chief. Eventually she realized we weren't leaving the house, so she made herself a sandwich and headed upstairs to Google divorce lawyers.
—Bill Simmons, ESPN, 6 Dec. 2004
Have you ever googled yourself, maybe late at night, when nobody else was around? It's OK, you can admit it—everybody does it.
—Tom Maurstad, Dallas Morning News, 17 Apr. 2004
Rachael O'Connor, MSNBC Newsweek, 24 June 2025
Enabling Product Conversations People aren’t Googling which running shoes to buy anymore.
—Expert Panel®, Forbes.com, 16 June 2025
No more scrambling for YouTube videos or Googling formulas mid-study session.
—Stackcommerce Team, PC Magazine, 4 June 2025
Accessing social media, streaming videos or Googling information on a device while driving are against the law in Minnesota, even in hands-free mode.
—Kristi Miller, Twin Cities, 20 May 2025
See All Example Sentences for google
Cite this Entry
“Google.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/google. Accessed 5 Jul. 2025.
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