What Was Google's Original Name Before It Became Google?

Discover Google's original name, BackRub, and learn about its founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin's inspiration behind the rebranding.

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Google's old name is BackRub. It was founded in 1996 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they were Ph.D. students at Stanford University. They renamed it Google in 1997, a play on the word 'googol'—the number 1 followed by 100 zeros—to reflect their mission to organize a seemingly infinite amount of information on the web.

FAQs & Answers

  1. Why was Google originally called BackRub? Google was originally named BackRub because the search engine analyzed the web's backlinks to rank pages, reflecting its approach to evaluating site importance.
  2. When did Google change its name from BackRub? The name changed from BackRub to Google in 1997 to better reflect the mission of organizing vast amounts of information using the concept of a 'googol,' a large number.
  3. Who founded Google and when? Google was founded in 1996 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they were Ph.D. students at Stanford University.

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