JSON API reference

Boolean OR Search

Boolean OR Search [ OR ]
Description	The OR query term retrieves documents that include one of a series of (two or more) query terms. To use the OR query term, you would insert the search term OR, in uppercase letters, between each term in the series. You can also use the "as_oq" request parameter (like "as_oq=London+Paris") to submit a search for any term in a set of terms. Note: If a search request specifies the query "London+OR+Paris", the search results will include documents containing at least one of those two words. In some cases, documents in the search results may contain both words.
Examples	Search for London or Paris: User input:london OR paris Query term:q=london+OR+paris Search for vacation and either London or Paris: Query term:q=vacation+london+OR+paris Search for vacation and one of London, Paris or chocolates: Query term:  q=vacation+london+OR+paris+OR+chocolates Search for vacation and chocolates and either london or paris, with the least weight being given to chocolates: Query term:  q=vacation+london+OR+paris+chocolates Search for vacation, chocolates and flowers in documents that also contain either London or Paris: Query term:  q=vacation+london+OR+paris+chocolates+flowers Search for vacation and one of London or Paris and also search for one of chocolates or flowers: Query term:  q=vacation+london+OR+paris+chocolates+OR+flowers

Boolean Operators

You may use Boolean operators in values for the following parameters:

• cr
• lr

Boolean Operator Definitions

Note: You cannot include spaces in parameter values.

Boolean AND [.]
Description	The AND operator (.) returns results that are in the intersection of the collections to either side of the "." operator.
Examples	This example removes all results that are in either French or Italian: lr=(-lang_fr).(-lang_it)

Boolean NOT [-]
Description	The NOT operator (-) removes all results that are in the collection immediately following the minus ("-") operator.
Examples	This example removes all results that are in French: lr=-lang_fr This example removes all results that are in either French or Italian: lr=(-lang_fr).(-lang_it) Note: You may have noticed that the second example above uses the Boolean AND operator to specify that results should not be written in French or Italian. Depending on the placement of parentheses in your query, you could use either the Boolean AND operator or the Boolean OR operator to express this query. This is because if a document is written in French, then it is not written in Italian. Thus, your Boolean statement must express that the document is not written in French and the document is not written in Italian.

Boolean OR [|]
Description	The OR operator (|) returns results that are in either the collection to the left or the collection to the right of the pipe ("|") operator.
Examples	This example returns all results that are written in either Simplified Chinese or Traditional Chinese: lr=lang_zh-TW|lang_zh-CN This example requests all results that are not written in French or Italian; notice that it places parentheses in a different location than the sample query for the Boolean AND operator: lr=-(lang_fr|lang_it)

Boolean Parentheses [()]
Description	This operator lets you ensure that all terms in the innermost set of parentheses are evaluated before terms outside the parentheses are evaluated. You can use parentheses to adjust the order in which terms are evaluated.
Examples	The example for the NOT [-] operator shows the following construct for request results that are not written in either French or Italian: lr=(-lang_fr).(-lang_it) The example for the OR (|) operator also shows a request for results not written in French of Italian. Since the latter example uses the OR operator rather than the AND operator, it also must change the location of the parentheses: lr=-(lang_fr|lang_it)

Internationalizing Queries and Results Presentation

The Google WebSearch service enables you to search for documents in multiple languages. You can specify the character encoding that should be used to interpret your HTTP request and to encode your response. You can also filter results to only include documents written in certain languages.

The following sections discuss issues related to searching in multiple languages:

• Interface Languages
• Simplified and Traditional Chinese Search

Interface Languages

You can use the "hl" request parameter to identify the language of your graphical interface. The "hl" parameter value may affect search results, especially on international queries when language restriction (using the "lr" parameter) is not explicitly specified. In such cases, the "hl" parameter may promote search results in the same language as the user's input language.

We suggest you explicitly set the "hl" parameter in search results to ensure that Google selects the highest quality search results for each query.

Please see the Supported Interface Languages section for a complete list of valid values for the "hl" parameter.

Simplified and Traditional Chinese Search

Simplified Chinese and Traditional Chinese are two writing variants of the Chinese language. The same concept may be written differently in each variant. Given a query in one of the variants, the Google WebSearch service can return results that include pages in both variants.

To use this feature:

1. Set the "c2coff" request parameter to 0
   and
2. Do one of the following:
   • Do not set the "lr" request parameter
     or
   • Set the "lr" request parameter to lr=lang_zh-TW|lang_zh-CN

The following example shows the query parameters you would include in a request for results in both simplified and traditional Chinese. (Note that additional required information, such as the "client", is not included in the example.)

search?hl=zh-CN
    &lr=lang_zh-TW|lang_zh-CN
    &c2coff=0

Filtering Results

Google WebSearch provides a number of ways to filter your search results:

• Automatic Filtering of Search Results
• Filtering Adult Content with SafeSearch

Automatic Filtering of Search Results

In an effort to provide the best search results possible, Google uses two techniques to automatically filter search results that are generally considered undesirable:

• Duplicate Content—If multiple documents contain the same information, then only the most relevant document of that set is included in your search results.

• Host Crowding—If there are many search results from the same site, Google may not show all the results from that site or may show the results lower in
  the ranking than they otherwise would have been.

We recommend you leave these filters on for typical search requests because the filters significantly enhance the quality of most search results. However, you can bypass these automatic filters by setting the "filter" query parameter to 0 in your search request.

Filtering Adult Content with SafeSearch

Many Google customers do not want to display search results for sites that contain adult content. Using our SafeSearch filter, you can screen for search results that contain adult content and eliminate them. Google's filters use proprietary technology to check keywords, phrases and URLs. While no filters are 100 percent accurate, SafeSearch will remove the overwhelming majority of adult content from your search results.

Google strives to keep SafeSearch as current and comprehensive as possible by continually crawling the Web and by incorporating updates from user suggestions.

You can adjust the degree to which Google filters your results for adult content using the "safe" query parameter. The following table explains Google's SafeSearch settings and how those settings will affect your search results:

SafeSearch Level	Description
high	Enables a stricter version of safe search.
medium	Blocks web pages containing pornography and other explicit sexual content.
off	Does not filter adult content from search results.

* The default SafeSearch setting is off.

International Values

• Supported Interface Languages
• Country Collection Values
• Country Codes

Supported Interface Languages

Google supports more than 80 languages. The default interface language is English. The following list identifies all of the interface languages that Google supports.

Display Language	hl Parameter Value
Afrikaans	af
Albanian	sq
Amharic	sm
Arabic	ar
Azerbaijani	az
Basque	eu
Belarusian	be
Bengali	bn
Bihari	bh
Bosnian	bs
Bulgarian	bg
Catalan	ca
Chinese (Simplified)	zh-CN
Chinese (Traditional)	zh-TW
Croatian	hr
Czech	cs
Danish	da
Dutch	nl
English	en
Esperanto	eo
Estonian	et
Faroese	fo
Finnish	fi
French	fr
Frisian	fy
Galician	gl
Georgian	ka
German	de
Greek	el
Gujarati	gu
Hebrew	iw
Hindi	hi
Hungarian	hu
Icelandic	is
Indonesian	id
Interlingua	ia
Irish	ga
Italian	it
Japanese	ja
Javanese	jw
Kannada	kn
Korean	ko
Latin	la
Latvian	lv
Lithuanian	lt
Macedonian	mk
Malay	ms
Malayam	ml
Maltese	mt
Marathi	mr
Nepali	ne
Norwegian	no
Norwegian (Nynorsk)	nn
Occitan	oc
Persian	fa
Polish	pl
Portuguese (Brazil)	pt-BR
Portuguese (Portugal)	pt-PT
Punjabi	pa
Romanian	ro
Russian	ru
Scots Gaelic	gd
Serbian	sr
Sinhalese	si
Slovak	sk
Slovenian	sl
Spanish	es
Sudanese	su
Swahili	sw
Swedish	sv
Tagalog	tl
Tamil	ta
Telugu	te
Thai	th
Tigrinya	ti
Turkish	tr
Ukrainian	uk
Urdu	ur
Uzbek	uz
Vietnamese	vi
Welsh	cy
Xhosa	xh
Zulu	zu

Country Collection Values

You can use the following values to specify a country filter using the "cr" query parameter:

Country	Country Collection Name
Afghanistan	countryAF
Albania	countryAL
Algeria	countryDZ
American Samoa	countryAS
Andorra	countryAD
Angola	countryAO
Anguilla	countryAI
Antarctica	countryAQ
Antigua and Barbuda	countryAG
Argentina	countryAR
Armenia	countryAM
Aruba	countryAW
Australia	countryAU
Austria	countryAT
Azerbaijan	countryAZ
Bahamas	countryBS
Bahrain	countryBH
Bangladesh	countryBD
Barbados	countryBB
Belarus	countryBY
Belgium	countryBE
Belize	countryBZ
Benin	countryBJ
Bermuda	countryBM
Bhutan	countryBT
Bolivia	countryBO
Bosnia and Herzegovina	countryBA
Botswana	countryBW
Bouvet Island	countryBV
Brazil	countryBR
British Indian Ocean Territory	countryIO
Brunei Darussalam	countryBN
Bulgaria	countryBG
Burkina Faso	countryBF
Burundi	countryBI
Cambodia	countryKH
Cameroon	countryCM
Canada	countryCA
Cape Verde	countryCV
Cayman Islands	countryKY
Central African Republic	countryCF
Chad	countryTD
Chile	countryCL
China	countryCN
Christmas Island	countryCX
Cocos (Keeling) Islands	countryCC
Colombia	countryCO
Comoros	countryKM
Congo	countryCG
Congo, the Democratic Republic of the	countryCD
Cook Islands	countryCK
Costa Rica	countryCR
Cote D'ivoire	countryCI
Croatia (Hrvatska)	countryHR
Cuba	countryCU
Cyprus	countryCY
Czech Republic	countryCZ
Denmark	countryDK
Djibouti	countryDJ
Dominica	countryDM
Dominican Republic	countryDO
East Timor	countryTP
Ecuador	countryEC
Egypt	countryEG
El Salvador	countrySV
Equatorial Guinea	countryGQ
Eritrea	countryER
Estonia	countryEE
Ethiopia	countryET
European Union	countryEU
Falkland Islands (Malvinas)	countryFK
Faroe Islands	countryFO
Fiji	countryFJ
Finland	countryFI
France	countryFR
France, Metropolitan	countryFX
French Guiana	countryGF
French Polynesia	countryPF
French Southern Territories	countryTF
Gabon	countryGA
Gambia	countryGM
Georgia	countryGE
Germany	countryDE
Ghana	countryGH
Gibraltar	countryGI
Greece	countryGR
Greenland	countryGL
Grenada	countryGD
Guadeloupe	countryGP
Guam	countryGU
Guatemala	countryGT
Guinea	countryGN
Guinea-Bissau	countryGW
Guyana	countryGY
Haiti	countryHT
Heard Island and Mcdonald Islands	countryHM
Holy See (Vatican City State)	countryVA
Honduras	countryHN
Hong Kong	countryHK
Hungary	countryHU
Iceland	countryIS
India	countryIN
Indonesia	countryID
Iran, Islamic Republic of	countryIR
Iraq	countryIQ
Ireland	countryIE
Israel	countryIL
Italy	countryIT
Jamaica	countryJM
Japan	countryJP
Jordan	countryJO
Kazakhstan	countryKZ
Kenya	countryKE
Kiribati	countryKI
Korea, Democratic People's Republic of	countryKP
Korea, Republic of	countryKR
Kuwait	countryKW
Kyrgyzstan	countryKG
Lao People's Democratic Republic	countryLA
Latvia	countryLV
Lebanon	countryLB
Lesotho	countryLS
Liberia	countryLR
Libyan Arab Jamahiriya	countryLY
Liechtenstein	countryLI
Lithuania	countryLT
Luxembourg	countryLU
Macao	countryMO
Macedonia, the Former Yugosalv Republic of	countryMK
Madagascar	countryMG
Malawi	countryMW
Malaysia	countryMY
Maldives	countryMV
Mali	countryML
Malta	countryMT
Marshall Islands	countryMH
Martinique	countryMQ
Mauritania	countryMR
Mauritius	countryMU
Mayotte	countryYT
Mexico	countryMX
Micronesia, Federated States of	countryFM
Moldova, Republic of	countryMD
Monaco	countryMC
Mongolia	countryMN
Montserrat	countryMS
Morocco	countryMA
Mozambique	countryMZ
Myanmar	countryMM
Namibia	countryNA
Nauru	countryNR
Nepal	countryNP
Netherlands	countryNL
Netherlands Antilles	countryAN
New Caledonia	countryNC
New Zealand	countryNZ
Nicaragua	countryNI
Niger	countryNE
Nigeria	countryNG
Niue	countryNU
Norfolk Island	countryNF
Northern Mariana Islands	countryMP
Norway	countryNO
Oman	countryOM
Pakistan	countryPK
Palau	countryPW
Palestinian Territory	countryPS
Panama	countryPA
Papua New Guinea	countryPG
Paraguay	countryPY
Peru	countryPE
Philippines	countryPH
Pitcairn	countryPN
Poland	countryPL
Portugal	countryPT
Puerto Rico	countryPR
Qatar	countryQA
Reunion	countryRE
Romania	countryRO
Russian Federation	countryRU
Rwanda	countryRW
Saint Helena	countrySH
Saint Kitts and Nevis	countryKN
Saint Lucia	countryLC
Saint Pierre and Miquelon	countryPM
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines	countryVC
Samoa	countryWS
San Marino	countrySM
Sao Tome and Principe	countryST
Saudi Arabia	countrySA
Senegal	countrySN
Serbia and Montenegro	countryCS
Seychelles	countrySC
Sierra Leone	countrySL
Singapore	countrySG
Slovakia	countrySK
Slovenia	countrySI
Solomon Islands	countrySB
Somalia	countrySO
South Africa	countryZA
South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands	countryGS
Spain	countryES
Sri Lanka	countryLK
Sudan	countrySD
Suriname	countrySR
Svalbard and Jan Mayen	countrySJ
Swaziland	countrySZ
Sweden	countrySE
Switzerland	countryCH
Syrian Arab Republic	countrySY
Taiwan, Province of China	countryTW
Tajikistan	countryTJ
Tanzania, United Republic of	countryTZ
Thailand	countryTH
Togo	countryTG
Tokelau	countryTK
Tonga	countryTO
Trinidad and Tobago	countryTT
Tunisia	countryTN
Turkey	countryTR
Turkmenistan	countryTM
Turks and Caicos Islands	countryTC
Tuvalu	countryTV
Uganda	countryUG
Ukraine	countryUA
United Arab Emirates	countryAE
United Kingdom	countryUK
United States	countryUS
United States Minor Outlying Islands	countryUM
Uruguay	countryUY
Uzbekistan	countryUZ
Vanuatu	countryVU
Venezuela	countryVE
Vietnam	countryVN
Virgin Islands, British	countryVG
Virgin Islands, U.S.	countryVI
Wallis and Futuna	countryWF
Western Sahara	countryEH
Yemen	countryYE
Yugoslavia	countryYU
Zambia	countryZM
Zimbabwe	countryZW

Country Codes

The following table lists the two-letter country codes that can be used as values of the "gl" parameter:

Country	Country Code
Afghanistan	af
Albania	al
Algeria	dz
American Samoa	as
Andorra	ad
Angola	ao
Anguilla	ai
Antarctica	aq
Antigua and Barbuda	ag
Argentina	ar
Armenia	am
Aruba	aw
Australia	au
Austria	at
Azerbaijan	az
Bahamas	bs
Bahrain	bh
Bangladesh	bd
Barbados	bb
Belarus	by
Belgium	be
Belize	bz
Benin	bj
Bermuda	bm
Bhutan	bt
Bolivia	bo
Bosnia and Herzegovina	ba
Botswana	bw
Bouvet Island	bv
Brazil	br
British Indian Ocean Territory	io
Brunei Darussalam	bn
Bulgaria	bg
Burkina Faso	bf
Burundi	bi
Cambodia	kh
Cameroon	cm
Canada	ca
Cape Verde	cv
Cayman Islands	ky
Central African Republic	cf
Chad	td
Chile	cl
China	cn
Christmas Island	cx
Cocos (Keeling) Islands	cc
Colombia	co
Comoros	km
Congo	cg
Congo, the Democratic Republic of the	cd
Cook Islands	ck
Costa Rica	cr
Cote D'ivoire	ci
Croatia	hr
Cuba	cu
Cyprus	cy
Czech Republic	cz
Denmark	dk
Djibouti	dj
Dominica	dm
Dominican Republic	do
Ecuador	ec
Egypt	eg
El Salvador	sv
Equatorial Guinea	gq
Eritrea	er
Estonia	ee
Ethiopia	et
Falkland Islands (Malvinas)	fk
Faroe Islands	fo
Fiji	fj
Finland	fi
France	fr
French Guiana	gf
French Polynesia	pf
French Southern Territories	tf
Gabon	ga
Gambia	gm
Georgia	ge
Germany	de
Ghana	gh
Gibraltar	gi
Greece	gr
Greenland	gl
Grenada	gd
Guadeloupe	gp
Guam	gu
Guatemala	gt
Guinea	gn
Guinea-Bissau	gw
Guyana	gy
Haiti	ht
Heard Island and Mcdonald Islands	hm
Holy See (Vatican City State)	va
Honduras	hn
Hong Kong	hk
Hungary	hu
Iceland	is
India	in
Indonesia	id
Iran, Islamic Republic of	ir
Iraq	iq
Ireland	ie
Israel	il
Italy	it
Jamaica	jm
Japan	jp
Jordan	jo
Kazakhstan	kz
Kenya	ke
Kiribati	ki
Korea, Democratic People's Republic of	kp
Korea, Republic of	kr
Kuwait	kw
Kyrgyzstan	kg
Lao People's Democratic Republic	la
Latvia	lv
Lebanon	lb
Lesotho	ls
Liberia	lr
Libyan Arab Jamahiriya	ly
Liechtenstein	li
Lithuania	lt
Luxembourg	lu
Macao	mo
Macedonia, the Former Yugosalv Republic of	mk
Madagascar	mg
Malawi	mw
Malaysia	my
Maldives	mv
Mali	ml
Malta	mt
Marshall Islands	mh
Martinique	mq
Mauritania	mr
Mauritius	mu
Mayotte	yt
Mexico	mx
Micronesia, Federated States of	fm
Moldova, Republic of	md
Monaco	mc
Mongolia	mn
Montserrat	ms
Morocco	ma
Mozambique	mz
Myanmar	mm
Namibia	na
Nauru	nr
Nepal	np
Netherlands	nl
Netherlands Antilles	an
New Caledonia	nc
New Zealand	nz
Nicaragua	ni
Niger	ne
Nigeria	ng
Niue	nu
Norfolk Island	nf
Northern Mariana Islands	mp
Norway	no
Oman	om
Pakistan	pk
Palau	pw
Palestinian Territory, Occupied	ps
Panama	pa
Papua New Guinea	pg
Paraguay	py
Peru	pe
Philippines	ph
Pitcairn	pn
Poland	pl
Portugal	pt
Puerto Rico	pr
Qatar	qa
Reunion	re
Romania	ro
Russian Federation	ru
Rwanda	rw
Saint Helena	sh
Saint Kitts and Nevis	kn
Saint Lucia	lc
Saint Pierre and Miquelon	pm
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines	vc
Samoa	ws
San Marino	sm
Sao Tome and Principe	st
Saudi Arabia	sa
Senegal	sn
Serbia and Montenegro	cs
Seychelles	sc
Sierra Leone	sl
Singapore	sg
Slovakia	sk
Slovenia	si
Solomon Islands	sb
Somalia	so
South Africa	za
South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands	gs
Spain	es
Sri Lanka	lk
Sudan	sd
Suriname	sr
Svalbard and Jan Mayen	sj
Swaziland	sz
Sweden	se
Switzerland	ch
Syrian Arab Republic	sy
Taiwan, Province of China	tw
Tajikistan	tj
Tanzania, United Republic of	tz
Thailand	th
Timor-Leste	tl
Togo	tg
Tokelau	tk
Tonga	to
Trinidad and Tobago	tt
Tunisia	tn
Turkey	tr
Turkmenistan	tm
Turks and Caicos Islands	tc
Tuvalu	tv
Uganda	ug
Ukraine	ua
United Arab Emirates	ae
United Kingdom	uk
United States	us
United States Minor Outlying Islands	um
Uruguay	uy
Uzbekistan	uz
Vanuatu	vu
Venezuela	ve
Viet Nam	vn
Virgin Islands, British	vg
Virgin Islands, U.S.	vi
Wallis and Futuna	wf
Western Sahara	eh
Yemen	ye
Zambia	zm
Zimbabwe	zw