First, I often get asked “what is that?”, when I ask someone to open a “web browser window”. So, to make sure it’s clear, a web browser is a program that allows you to connect to and display websites. Internet Explorer, Firefox, Google Chrome, Apple’s Safari, all those are examples of web browsers.

Ok so now, what are the address and search bars? The address bar is the field in the upper side of the web browser window that 1) displays the current website being visited and 2) accepts input to change to a different website. So if you go to the address bar and you enter “remotehelpexpert.com” and press enter, the web browser will open the home page for my website.

The search bar, a field usually also located in the upper side of the web browser (usually to the right of the address bar) has a different purpose. It will search the internet for whatever you write in it.  

Now, for those who use Google Chrome, you know that there is no search bar in the browser. Well, at least not separate. The address bar and search bar are merged into one. If you enter something that Chrome recognizes as a website it will treat it as input for the address bar – otherwise it will treat it as input for the search bar. But Chrome is the only exception that I know of.

The main reason I  mention all this is, I have observed a number of users who seem to mix these two different bars. For example, I instruct someone to go to “www.speedtest.net”, a website that allows to measure the speed of your internet connection. The user enters “www.speedtest.net” in the SEARCH bar and presses enter. The search engine then displays the results and naturally, the website will appear as one of the top results. Now the user clicks on the search result to go to the website. An extra step that is not needed if he/she were to simply enter the website address in the address bar!

Tip of the day, works for all browsers: Go into the address bar for your web browser and enter a website name, like “google”. Leave the “www”, the “.com” part, everything else out. Just type the name of the website, like “google” or “facebook”. Now press the control key and enter. The browser will write the rest for you and open that website. Try it!