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When was google.com built?

Analyzed 19 October 2026. Re-analyze

Estimated launch

November 1998

Medium confidenceLikely range: May–November 1998

There's good evidence for the year, but the exact month is less certain.

Website age
~28 years
From estimated launch
Domain registered
September 1997
Not the launch date
First evidence
November 1998
Internet Archive (Wayback Machine)
Current version
No clear redesign
A possible change is in the timeline

History at a glance

The domain and the website have separate lives. Website age is measured from the launch, not from registration.

Domain registeredLikely launch rangeWebsite onlineMajor change

Timeline

  1. September 1997

    Domain registered

    The domain was registered. This is not the same as the website launching.

    Confirmed

  2. May–November 1998

    Estimated launch

    Based on: first archived copy of the website.

    Medium confidenceView evidence

  3. Between November and December 1998

    Possible major redesign

    The page layout changed a lot.

    Not certainBeforeAfter

  4. After April 2005

    Changed since the last archived copy

    The page layout changed a lot.

    Not certainLast archived copy

  5. October 2026

    Current website

    “Google”

    ConfirmedVisit

Built with today

Detected on the live homepage. Select a technology to see the evidence.

No common technologies were detected with enough confidence to report.

Why we think it launched in 19982 pieces of evidence, each linked to its source
  • First archived copy of the website: November 1998.
  • Domain registered: September 1997 (14 months earlier).

  1. September 1997

    Domain registered

    The domain's current registration began on this date. A website can only launch after this, but often launches much later.

    Sets the earliest possible dateRDAP registry dataView source

  2. November 1998

    First archived copy of the website

    The earliest successful snapshot of the homepage showing real website content in the Internet Archive.

    The estimate is based on thisInternet Archive (Wayback Machine)View source

What we checked

  • Domain registry (RDAP)Checked
  • Internet Archive indexChecked
  • Live websiteChecked
  • Archived page comparisonChecked

85 months of archived homepage copies; 11 compared in detail. BuiltWhen estimates from observable evidence and can be wrong. How estimates work

Domain registrationRegistered September 1997 · MarkMonitor Inc.
Registered
15 September 1997
Registration expires
14 September 2028
Registry record updated
9 September 2019
Registrar
MarkMonitor Inc.
Nameservers
ns1.google.com, ns2.google.com, ns3.google.com, ns4.google.com

Public registry data via RDAP. Registrant details are never collected.

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