13 Alternative Search Engines That Find What Google Can’t

alternative search engine sitesGoogle has become the standard search engine of virtually every web-goer on the internet today. In fact “to Google” is pretty much synonymous with “to search”.

But that certainly doesn’t mean that other search engines can’t do a decent, if not better, job and this list has been compiled for just this reason.

So check out this catalog of awesome alternative search engines that are certain to help you search faster and more efficiently on that World Wide Web.

Music & Video

MP3Realm

If you’re one of the countless people today who gets their music digitally, then MP3Realm is for you. The site features a basic search for MP3′s as well as song lyrics.

MP3s can be streamed, added to playlists and of course downloaded. The advanced search option also lets users browse MP3′s by genre (a ton to choose from) or by artist.

mp3 realm

TuneFind

I’m sure that some part of all of our lives has been spent in front of the television and I always manage to find a song that catches my fancy no matter what I’m watching. That’s where TuneFind comes in; the site is dedicated to providing users with the names of artists/song titles that have appeared on their favorite television shows, and even movies.

You can even reverse look up artists, to see which films and shows their music has been featured on.

tunefind

MuviBee

A site dedicated to the best of both worlds, MuviBee lets users search for music and music videos (via YouTube) that might be associated with the song. The site proves to be versatile and certainly unique, providing users with Top 10 Charts from iTunes, the US, UK and Germany as well as direct links to Amazon and iTunes if you should decide to purchase music you like.

muvibee

ClipBlast

ClipBlast features short videos from a variety of mainstream sources, including Hulu, TBS, BBC etc. The site is easy to use and loaded with enough content to keep you busy for hours.

Blinkx

Blinkx is another quality video search engine that collects results from hundreds of video/television providers and incorporates them into your search. The site also lets you browse videos from a myriad of topics.

If, by the way, you’re having trouble with videos that are limited to region, like Hulu, then try out some of the neat solutions we’ve covered here at MUO.

Files & Others

Rapidshare1

Rapidshare has become a premium site for uploading and serving content for hungry web users. It’s natural then to expect a site devoted to searching for files on Rapidshare, and Rapidshare1 is it. The site is dead simple and all you need to get going is something to look for.

Filestube

Filestube takes Rapidshare1 to another level by aggregating its searches to include several other networks including MegaUpload, YouSendIt, Filefront etc. Searches can also be filtered by file type which adds more convenience to the engine.

FileSnatcher

Another good site, FileSnatcher lets you look for files on a few different file sharing networks, including Badongo, Mediafire and 4shared.

Recipes & Cooking

Cookstr

As the name implies, Cookstr is for the wannabe-chef in all of us. The site is clean and intuitive and searching is simple. What I like best about Cookstr is the wide range of search filters that they offer, some of which include searching for recipes based on chef, author, skill level, holiday, course, cost and much more.

Keep in mind that the site is still in beta and Cookstr will be adding a “menu-search” feature as well as helpful tips/techniques as the site develops.

RecipeZaar

RecipeZaar is another excellent website for searching up quality recipes for your next meal. Users can also search for ‘cookbooks’ which are a collection of another user’s recipes. Also, recipe results feature ratings and nutritional information.

Fun

Tickex

Trying to buy tickets online? Well then check out Tickex, the site that collects search results from multiple ticket providers for concerts, sporting events and theatre. Searches can be made by venue, country, event, city etc. The site also provides direct links to retailers to simplify your experience even further.

Quotiki

Looking for something clever to say in your next argument? Try out Quotiki, a quotation search engine that has collected some of the wisest and shrewd idioms the world over.

WhatsOpen

WhatsOpen is a young site, but its concept is awesome. They let users see what stores, malls and shops are currently open in their neighborhood and how long they’ll be open. As I’ve mentioned, the site is rather new and the working locations are still limited to a few key cities in the US of A, but rest assured new locations are being added as the site grows.

So there you have it readers, 13 awesome search engines for you to play with. Questions, comments, suggestions? Then drop us a line in the comments and share your thoughts with fellow MUO followers.

Tagged: • • • • • • •

Kabir Chauhan

I'm a 20 year old medical science student from Canada. I enjoy working with open-source programs, perusing the interwebs as well as anything to with science. While it's a thrill to write for MUO I hope to get to med school and eventually get my MD.

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  • Jim

    http://rapidshare-search-engine.com/ is better than Rapidshare1 no annoying pop ups

    • http://rapidshare-search-engine.com CA

      Yes there are pop ups on this site and my virus checker picked up a Trojan…thank goodness Ihave that!

  • tansui

    You missed out two good search engines :
    http://downloadanystuff.org for downloading free stuff
    and http://fatfingers.com/ for finding things on ebay

    • Kabir Chauhan

      These are some excellent picks!

  • http://www.yahoo.com Ammar

    All are the same.

    All are full of Ads :-D

    • http://dibbsolutions.com Medisoft

      I use findsounds.com to find little audio clips like a door closing, baby crying, car starting, etc. No ads either.

  • Chris

    It is time people wake up to the grave dangers in putting everything into the corporate hands of just one or two companies (online or off). Therefore, I thank you for showing that it is not just possible, but doable.

  • unknown

    Any good site that has quality FREE xxx stuff

    • Audrey

      redtube.com

      • honkerparade

        yep

  • http://magiclamp.qsh.in Viral

    Have a look at MagicLamp (http://www.magiclamp.qsh.in)

    A highly customized search to help find the following:
    - Movies
    - Songs
    - Code

    Makes use of google custom search but has a highly powerful customization. Additionally there are lists of ~1000 sites in each category to stress upon when searching. The results are just awesome.

  • http://falaque.wordpress.com/ falaque

    Google is no more god…:)
    Thanks for such a nice info.

  • James

    Don’t forget the Science search engines Scirus and for papers Arxiv.org is invaluable. Arxiv is referenced regularaly as a source of information for the widely regarded NewScientist Magazine.

    • ADwyer

      Thanks for sharing this James, really good resource for my business. Great that this post has been so productive in uncovering great info. Thanks everyone!

    • FredThompson

      New Scientist is part of the AGW fraud. “Highly regarded” as “scientific” propaganda, perhaps…

  • http://flordeloto.com guille

    Try njouba.com to search torrents, rapidshare, PDF files,… and so on.

    I like it so much.

    Anyway, i love search on del.icio.us for tutorials, how-to’s pages, interesting articles and things like this. The links you get searching on del.icio.us have been seen interesting for a human person. And no robotics-automatic-systems can do this like a person.

  • torrent

    Ok, but you missed mininova.org

  • Crysiss

    No, not mininova – isohunt.com is better because it is indexing mininova and over 500 other torrent sites.

  • http://www.pushingbuttons.net Timothy

    Good for people who don’t know how to harness the power of google.

    For others, who are capable of understanding complex Google queries, you should try that. If you know what you are doing you can use Google to find just about anything.

    The only other search engines I use are those integrated with Flickr or DeviantART (to find Creative Commons images).

    • Asheer

      hey nice say man i completely agree with u with correct keywords u can surely reveal the awesome power of google

  • http://blog.eliotsykes.com/ Eliot Sykes

    Twitter’s search of all tweets is becoming my first choice search engine for some queries

    http://search.twitter.com/

    This could be the best human powered search engine out there.

    • What?

      What the hell Eliot, are you retarded? Yes that’s very useful, if you want to search twitter. That’s hardly a search engine.

      Anyway, great list. Thanks!

  • Mason

    Good list. http://www.fansnap.com & http://www.ticketstumbler.com do the same thing as tickex – check them out!

    • Kabir Chauhan

      Mason, I have to say these are not too shabby.

  • http://www.rmonline.me.uk Ross

    Great info. I will be trying some of the music ones out with some of the many obscure tracks I am after.

  • Srinivas

    Hi

    Any good search engine for e books? particularly IT stream.I know few URL’s but they are not complete.

    Srinivas

    • Kabir Chauhan

      I’ve been trying to find a few but I’ve only come across some mediocre , you could try http://www.ebook-search-engine.com/, but again, its not my favorite site for ebooks.

      Good Luck!

  • Srinivas

    Thanks Kabir…

    Srinivas

  • tacky residue

    Try octoparts.com for hard-to-find electronic bits; it’ll search all sorts of datbases and vendor parts lists.

  • http://www.newskinz.com bebo

    What a great list, have only seen 3 of them previously, big stumble bud :)

    • Kabir Chauhan

      Thanks a bunch bebo

  • http://www.aramamotoruoptimizasyonu.gen.tr Seo

    A good new search engines list except Google.

    • Kabir Chauhan

      Glad you like it Seo!

  • Regine

    Thank you for sharing this.

    • Kabir Chauhan

      Thanks for the comment!

  • http:unboredme.blogspot.com lazyking

    Nice post! maybe I’ll put a link on my blog unboredme.blogspot,com

  • http://www.borellus.com Borellus

    Snazzy, I might use a few of them.

  • Chris

    These are good but what about the growth in human-powered search and research services? I still have trouble filtering through the ads and jazz when I am doing research online. I may not be 100 percent on the human-driven services but sites like sweetsearch.com are certainly growing on me.

  • Rob

    I bet you most of those are google backed queries for theirs sites….

  • http://homepagesfriends.net bill rice

    You guys should look at this paid to search site,
    its backed and powerd by Yahoo
    they pay you to search,

    Homepages Friends holds a deal with Yahoo and are the first paid to search company of its kind that holds a deal with a major search engine

    Home pages friends has been working in the charity and public sector for sometime now and provide there revenue sharing toolbars to help raise funds for those organisations.

    please check it out
    homepagesfriends.net

  • Jon

    To second Timothy’s comment above, I will say if you can’t find any of these things with Google, you are using it wrong. See here if you really want a powerful search that will find exactly what you’re looking for: http://johnny.ihackstuff.com/ghdb.php

    • kris

      hey jon… the postings on that link r old…. very old.

  • saurabh

    wow, thanks kabir. till now i thought search started and ended with google. cuil and zuula are ok as well.

    • Kabir Chauhan

      Thanks for the suggestions Saurabh!

  • Christopher

    If the results of the above engines are not from google, they are likely to have come from a site using the same technology… I simply think there is only so far you can go without relying on some sort of expert or human-based filter to clear away the weeds and find what works. Mahalo is fine but seems increasingly weak. Sweetsearch.com is one just launched that appears to have some staying power.

  • http://www.dorela.com Dorela

    Don’t forget mininova.org

  • naam mein kya rakha hai bhai?

    This is a rili nice post.
    awesome!

  • http://scarsproduction.blogspot.com/ Matt

    Midomi is another awesome search engine. You can hum/sing/whatever the tune and it will match up songs that sound like what you searched for.

  • http://aafter.com Subhankar Ray

    Well, our search engine http://aafter.com does some cool useful stuff that others do not do. We also do lot less tracking or monitoring.
    Regards,
    Subhankar Ray

    • Kabir Chauhan

      Subhankar, I’ve checked your engine out. It’s definitely something to be proud of, congrats and what you’ve accomplished!

  • http://www.aafter.com Subhankar Ray

    Kabir,
    Please, check out our search engine AAfter.com with simple features that no one has. Let me know what you think.
    1. URL => multiple tinyurls
    2. IP or domain => all about IP/ domain
    and so on..
    Cheers!
    Subhankar Ray
    Please, remove any duplicate comment. I had problem in commenting here.

  • http://www.trapsolutions.com/ Asweri

    Awesome list, great

  • http://www.atoztoa.com ATOzTOA

    For Rapidshare, you can take Advanced Search in Google and give domain as rapidshare.com.

    • Kabir Chauhan

      Another excellent suggestion.

  • Jason

    Your statement about “virtually everybody” using Google now is not true. In fact, there are more people than you think that use Yahoo. Yahoo has been around longer than Google. For those of us that have been using the internet since the ’90s Yahoo is usually the search engine of choice. For the younger crowd, I would agree that they use mostly Google.

    • Tori

      I’ve been using the internet since the 90s and while, yes there was a time when yahoo was the end all be all, I switched to Google as soon as I knew about it.

  • fkhan

    yea nice article and nice comments :) . informative

  • http://www.highvoltageseo.com High Voltage SEO

    Excellent article!

    RE: Jason. Google is by far the search engine of choice, there isn’t even a close second. Women prefer Yahoo! above other search engines, but Google is still king. :)

  • http://www.asknanu.com Raj

    Good one Kabir.

    First comes first is the Logic.

    http://www.asknanu.com

  • http://www.sakinaautos.com Aaqib

    Gud,, thanks alot

  • http://www.rvsalestraining.com Chuck

    I think alot of the ability of a site to be found has to do with how well a site is built and optimized. Most are not optimized correctly and therefore the necessity for different search engines to try to figure out what a page or site is about.

  • http://www.utogger.com UTogger

    Great post. I’m going to try some of these right now!

  • http://trypu.com sam

    I think alot of the ability of a site to be found has to do with how well a site is built and optimized

  • kiura

    didn’t like. thought rapidshare would be a great idea. yet every time I went to the site, advertisements jumped in my face….without any click on, or near or even appearance of said advertisement.

    not cool.

  • http://www.vlat.net Greg

    For file hosting search engine, i prefer http://www.avun.com
    Clean design, fast and much search result, no ads annoying.

  • david

    Nice article. Appreciate Coostr.

    Would like suggest my favorite.

  • http://www.Radid4files.com Rapid4files lover

    Very very nice list! Thank you very much

  • Mitch

    Here’s the only problem with this list – Google finds just about anything. However most, if not all, of these sites are specialized whether it be for music, video, or what have you.

    Just puttin’ it out there.

  • Dhirav
  • http://premiumzone.org/ Nashya

    Hey Dirav, avun is a complete search engine, thanks.

  • http://premiumzone.org/ Nashya

    Where’s did u get all this info? Its very usefull, thanks!

  • FiFtHeLeMeNt

    Nice List , Thank you.
    But The Best I found is http://www.crawlrapidshare.com
    it searches the net in real time.
    I suggest you to add this to your list ;)

  • BobCruncher

    I always use http://www.metacrawler.com. It uses many of the other search engines including Google and Yahoo!, combines the results, rates them, and orders them.

  • Max Sterbation

    redtube
    youporn
    pornhub
    tube8

  • hilary

    this was an amazing list – never heard of any of them!

  • http://www.supermobilegame.com Super Mobile Game

    thanks nashya for avun search engine

  • http://www.xyshop.co.uk Tania

    I think there is no one who can compete google.

  • dnif lima

    http://rapidlinkfind.com/ is very good at rapidshare.com files.

  • http://www.genbilisim.com.tr arama motoru optimizasyonu

    thanks for these great resources. I am really glad to find them

  • http://fileonfire.com akram

    please take a look on the best way to search rapidshare

    just go to rapidshare and type the thing you like to find and in miliseconds you have it :) have fun

  • http://www.xyshop.co.uk OnlineShopper

    For those who are looking for shopping comparison then the best UK online shopping site is XYShop.

  • http://butiwanttowatchit.com/ almond

    how about http://butiwanttowatchit.com/ videos search engines wrap into one

  • http://fileknow.com Mike

    Try http://fileknow.com rapidshare search engine. Big and up to date database,

  • http://www.muzikdinlet.net/ müzik dinle

    Thanks for such a nice info.

  • Jason

    I personally prefer http://www.glotouch.com. It isn’t a search engine, but it works great as your homepage…you can choose any search engine you want.

  • haylet

    Maybe engines need to search only trusted sites. I think http://search4alive.com is pretty good. I found everything like movies, music, programs, e-books even subtitles. They are not just giving the links and the content too. You can give it a try.

  • suckit

    http://www.scrubd.com <<= documents & books

  • http://thebestchristmaspresents.info Nic

    well most people using google rite now,but for some reason i prefer using yahoo

  • http://www.bestsurabayaproperty.com jual rumah

    Quite awesome features. Thank you for the useful share.

  • http://ldii-sidoarjo-jawatimur.blogspot.com/ ldii

    Very interesting information. I like it.

  • http://www.reknova.de tim

    thanks good article

  • Natovr

    Twitter has a search engine. It’s like a thought search engine :)

  • http://www.designfactory24.com Marco

    I didn´t know that Twitter has a search engine. (???)

  • http://filesbay.net/ files bay

    Why http://filesbay.net/ is not reviewed? I think it’s best of rapidshare search engines. Also Files Bay have torrent search – http://torrents.filesbay.net/

  • http://on-file.com nana

    Try this: http://www.on-file.com, search files from RapidShare.com, Mediafire.com, 4shared.com, MegaUpload.com, Uploading.com in multiple languages. Thanks

  • http://filesdownloader.com filesdownloader

    you can try http://filesdownloader.com. This site combines power of filestube and filespump. great

  • Lanny B

    http://book-searchr.com – brand new search engine of free ebooks!

  • http://www.ldii-sidoarjo.org ldii

    Interesting, however Google is still the most leading provider.

  • http://rkplus.pl Strony Internetowe

    good article!

  • Dave

    one of the best File Search engines is http://www.filekingdom.com..There‘s no adverts and last I heard they have of 10 million links indexed