Google
Ranks hits by analyzing the number of sites linking to a particular site. Good for a specific topic. Google includes a growing list of specialized searches, including Google Scholar.
Yahoo! Search
Searches the general Web and its own directory. Yahoo is a large commercial portal and not a reliable tool for scholarly research.
Ask
Ranks according to the number of links from topically relevant pages. Ask analyzes your query and provides lists of terms to narrow or expand your search.
Ask for Kids
Returns a list of questions that it can answer, along with matches from other search engines.
Vivisimo
Searches databases of several search engines, and clusters results by topic.
Dogpile
Searches several top search engines, and returns results listed under each one, allowing you to compare sources.
Librarians' Internet Index
A directory of librarian-selected and annotated sites, listed under subject headings.
Yahoo! Directory
Web pages are submitted to the directory by many types of businesses. Good for consumer product information.
INFOMINE
A directory of scholarly Internet resources selected and annotated by college librarians.
Academic Info
A directory of college and research level Internet resources. Useful for high school research.