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Search help

What you can type into the AskRobots search box, and what the results page offers. Click any example to try it.

Quick answers

Some searches get a short answer above the results. The results are still there below it.

2+2(3+4)*52^10
Arithmetic: + and −, * or ×, / or ÷, ^ for powers, and brackets.
15% of 8080 + 15%
Percentages: a share of a number, or a number plus or minus a percent.
sqrt(144)sin(pi/2)
Square roots and functions: sqrt, sin, cos, tan, log, ln, abs, round, floor, ceil, exp, and pi and e. Angles are in radians.
what is 18 * 712 times 12
Ask in words: “what is”, plus, minus, times, divided by, mod.
= 24/7calculate 9-11
Start with = or “calculate” to get a sum for something that looks like a date, a score or a phone number. Without it, 24/7 and 9-11 are searched as words.
1Z999AA10123456784EA123456785USfedex 123456789012
A tracking number: which carrier it is, and a link to the carrier’s own tracking page. UPS, USPS, international post and Amazon numbers work on their own; for FedEx and DHL, add the carrier’s name. We only link; we never look up your package.
weather houstonweather 77002will it rain tomorrow houston
Weather: the forecast from the National Weather Service, for a US city, town or ZIP code. Add today, tonight, tomorrow or weekend, or ask if it will rain.
define serendipitywhat does ubiquitous mean
Dictionary: the meaning of a word, with its pronunciation and part of speech, from Wiktionary.

Going to a site

Type a site’s name or address and its own home page comes first, with a button to go there.

ebayebay.comjet blue
A site’s name or address, even typed with a space.
Not visited yet
A page we haven’t read yet: we know it from the sites that link to it. Its title and description come from them.

Search operators

Add these to your words. They work alone or together.

"climate change"jaguar -cartea OR coffee
An exact phrase in quotes, a word left out with a minus sign, either word with OR in capitals.
intitle:tutorial pythontax forms filetype:pdfelection after:2024related:python.org
Words in the title or the address, a file type, pages dated after or before a day, pages that link to a site, and sites like one.
mars site:nasa.gov
One site and its subdomains. Searching inside one site needs a free account: sign in and you can run 25 different site: searches a day. For more, use the Search API. Create a free account
mechanical keyboards type:forumchili type:recipe
One kind of page: forum, qa, docs, wiki, news, blog, recipe, product, paper, review and more.
高级搜索
Every operator, with an example of each, and a form that writes them for you.

Options on the results page

Links above the results. They change this search only.

election, News
All results, or News: pages their sites mark as news articles.
python release, sorted by date
Sort by relevance, or by date: newest first among the best matches.
python release, past week
Time: any time, or the past day, week, month or year.
definately, verbatim
Verbatim: your words exactly as typed, with no spelling fixes and no partial matches. It is a box on the advanced search form.
高级搜索
All of these as a form.

Spelling

We fix obvious typos, and you can always search for exactly what you typed.

definately
A search that finds almost nothing because of a typo shows results for the fixed spelling, with a link to search instead for what you typed. Otherwise you may see “Did you mean”.
"definately"
Spelling is never fixed with Verbatim, with quotes, or with an operator such as site:.

On the results page

Each result
Where the page is, what kind of page it is, and a line of facts: its topic, how long it takes to read, the trackers it carries, a quality score when we have one, and when we last checked it.
Screenshots
Small pictures of sites, so you can see a page before you open it.
Related searches and prices
Related searches, and the price on a shop’s page when the page states one.
AI summary
Some searches get a short summary beside the results, written by AI running on our own computer from the top results, with numbered links to its sources. AI can make mistakes: check them.
保存
Keep a result in your AskRobots links (with a free account).
Try it elsewhere
At the bottom of the page, links send the same search to other search engines.
Ads
Visitors who are not signed in may see one text ad under the first result, matched to the search. It says it is an ad and who paid for it. Signed in, you see none.
Browse topics
Sites by topic, from our directory.

Signed in

With a free account, the same search box searches what you keep too.

From your library
Your projects, tasks, notes, articles, contacts, files and links that match come first, then the web. A web result you have saved says Saved.
Did this answer it?
A thumb up or down on a web result says whether it answered your search.
Create a free account
Free, and you keep your notes, links, files and tasks.

设置

No account needed to search.

语言
AskRobots in your language: the language links at the foot of every page.
Make it your default
Search with AskRobots from your browser’s address bar.

Where to get more

Search API
Our results as JSON, for your own app or AI agent, with no ads. $25 a month.
For site owners
How our crawler reads sites, and how to control it with robots.txt.
About AskRobots
Who makes AskRobots, and why it is different.
贷记
The open data and software AskRobots is built on.
Contact us
A search that went wrong, or something you’d like it to do?

Something missing?

If a search doesn't do what this page says, or you'd like it to do something new, contact us or write to dan@askrobots.com.