Meta-Search engines allow you to search the databases of many different web search engines from a single location. With few exceptions, meta-search engines do not maintain their own databases. Meta-search engines are just one of many search tools available on the web. These tools are described on the Starting your Quest page.
Our favourite list of meta-search engines includes Dogpile, QueryServer, Clusty, Ixquick, and Ask. Each of these engines is described below.
Aside from it's dubious name, Dogpile is one of the best known meta-search engines on the Web. Dogpile references catalogues of as many as 18 search engines and directories. The specific directories and other related information is given on the Dogpile Help Topics page.
Dogpile is fast and reasonably accurate. We like it because it allows us to select the order in which Dogpile will search the various the various engines for us. However, at times we feel that Dogpile has been left a bit behind by a few newer and "smarter" meta-search engines.
We have found Clusty to be one of the most organized meta-search search engines. The results returned by Clusty are grouped into hierarchical categories. This makes it very easy to narrow down the final results based on your needs. More experienced searchers benefit from the Advanced Search page while newcomers can quickly learn the search syntax from the Help Page.
We like Clusty because of its grouping capabilities. The grouping technique makes it much easier to narrow down results as compared to other meta-search engines.
Ixquick is a powerful search engine covering over 10 large engines. Ixquick has a very detailed search syntax and translates search queries automatically for the various engines it queries. The "Highlighted Result" feature of Ixquick displays the resulting page with your search terms highlighted--this is a very useful feature as it allows you to quickly scan the result page for useful information.
We like Ixquick because of its clean and neat interface as well as the highlighted results feature.
Ask is one of the friendliest meta-search engines on the web, which makes it ideal for new users. It's most powerful feature is that it allows users to ask questions in plain English. Results returned are reasonably relevant and the slight lack of accuracy is more than made up for by the easy to use interface.
We like Ask because it helps build confidence among new searchers.
Metacrawlers and Meta Search Engines is an informative list of meta-search engines. It is a good place to learn more about meta-search engines!