How to Use Google Chrome Address Bar for Search?

Google Chrome is the king in web browser world both on desktop and mobile devices. Address bar is one unavoidable element in any browser. Most of us use Google Chrome browser’s address bar to open a website URL. However, the fact is that Google Chrome supports the search function directly from the address bar. In this article, we will explain how to use Google Chrome address bar for searching internet.

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Omnibox – Combination of Opening Address and Search

The feature of combining search with the address bar is called as omnibox. Browsers like Internet Explorer and Firefox offer an option to add separate search box next to the address bar. However, Google removed this type of separate search box with the introduction of omnibox search.

You may wonder, why Google needs to use this. The answer is simple – money!!! Google earns most of its revenue from advertisements shown in the search results. Thus increasing the searching speed of users will have direct impact on its revenue. On other hand, it will also be useful for users to get the information quickly with omnibox search.

How Address Bar Search Works?

With the latest Google Chrome browser, you can see “Search Google or type a URL” message in the address bar.

When you enter a keyword in address bar, Chrome will suggest the following options:

• To search the keyword using default search engine
• Other links stored in bookmarks, history and recent downloads
• Related keyword search option using default search engine

Search with Other Search Engines Using Tab

Omnibox removes the need of using separate search box and opening the search engine website every time when you want to search. Chrome will do the search, using default search engine setup in the browser. However, you can also search using different search engines.

• Enter the search engine website name like google, bing or yahoo.
• Type your keyword and press enter.
• This will open the search results using the search engine you entered.

Setting Search Engine for Omnibox

Instead of using the above method, you can also permanently setup your favorite search engine provider in Google Chrome.

• Open Chrome browser and click on the settings icon (three lines button) located on the upper right corner.
• Click on the “Settings” tab and then navigate to “Search engine” section in the sidebar. Alternatively, use this command URL chrome://settings/search to go to the settings page directly.
• Click on the drop down against “Search engine used in the address bar”.
• Select your search engine from the drop down list.

Using Custom Search Engine

If you do not find your favorite search engine in the default list, follow the below instructions to add your custom search engine.

• When you are in Chrome search settings page, click on the “Manage search engines” option.
• This will show you all default search engines stored in the browser.
• Chrome automatically indexes search engines whenever you use a search box on any website. You can see these options under “Other search engines” section.
• Therefore, if you want to use custom website as your search engine, first open that site and carry out a search. For example, if you use the search box located in the header section of this site then you will see this site address in the other search engines section as shown in the below picture.

• Earlier Chrome version was showing “Make default” button when you hover over the link. However, with the latest version, click three dots button against any search engine link and choose “Make default” option.
• Alternatively, click on the “Add” button under “Other search engines” section to add your custom website link.
• Click on it to make that search engine as a default search engine for your omnibox. You can also enter your own search engine details in the input box and make it as a default one.

• On the pop-up that appears, provide the search engine name, keyword and URL. You can refer any of the default search engines to get these details in proper format.

The URL should be with %s like below:

https://www.customsite.com/?q=%s