How to Play the "No Results" Google Prank

Last Updated: June 9, 2022 Tested

Do you want to prank your friends/coworkers using Google? There is a URL trick which makes it appear as though there are no results for a search term, and it baffles anyone who doesn't know about it.

Steps

1
Go to Google.
2
Search for a popular search term. This could be anything from "linux" to "real estate". It doesn't have to be extremely popular, just common enough that there will be quite a few listings.

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3
Add &num=0 to the end of the URL in the URL box. This forces Google to limit the number of results, in this case, to 0. Using a negative number instead will also work.
4
Show the URL to the person you want to prank. You can accomplish this in a variety of ways, including emailing them the link, or just showing them your computer screen. The person will likely be very surprised, and may call their friends over to see.
5
Conduct a search for something if the people being pranked start to worry. Once you conduct a search in the search box, it will show all results normally and you can laugh at them.

Warnings

Avoid showing this to people who know a lot about Google, as they will know how you did it.

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If you email the link, they may notice the code at the end.

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If you show this to people, tell them how it works so they won't think there is a problem. You wouldn't want someone calling tech support about this.

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