The highlights of Google's 25 years

The emergence of Google it happened in 1996, when Larry Page and Sergey Brin, two PhD students from Stanford University developed a new search algorithm, at the time dubbed Backrub, which organized results according to their relevance.

25 years ago, in 1998, Google was officially founded and, since then, it has become the world's main search engine. The company is also one of the most valuable in the world and has a significant impact on modern society.

Google has changed the way people access information and continues to innovate and expand its business. To celebrate a quarter of a century, throughout this article, we will talk about some of the brand's main tools.

Gmail

Launched in 2004, the Gmail is a free email service and is one of the great highlights of the company's universe. Available in over 100 languages, the platform is used by around 1.8 billion active users per month around the world, being the most popular email service in the United States of America.

When it was launched, the great highlight of this service was to offer 1GB of free storage to users, which, for the time, was something abyssal. 

Over the years, Google has been introducing new features, like the organized inbox, advanced search, filters, and, something less popular, ads.

Google Maps

One of Google's main tools was born in 2005, as a simple path guidance service. Since then, the Google Maps "followed the evolution of the times and kept improving."

'What started as just a basic map platform now includes tools such as' satellite images, transport information, traffic information, 3D street visualization (Street View) and local guides. 

Today, Google Maps is one of the most popular mapping services in the world and is used by about one billion people around the globe, being a valuable tool, not only in everyday life but also for those who want to travel and explore new areas.

YouTube

A year after its founding, in 2006, Google acquired YouTube, a sharing platform that was taking its first steps in the newly arrived era of social networks.

The complete transformation made by Google led YouTube to success and made it the most famous and most used video platform on the internet.

Creating content for YouTube has become a profession of astronomical profit for some and, in recent years, to be "}youtuber"became the dream of millions of children around the globe.

Android

Perhaps the biggest milestone for Google since the launch of the search engine was the introduction of Android, the most widely used operating system for smartphones in the world. 

Android was born in 2003, at the hands of a company of the same name, which would later be acquired by Google in 2005. At the time, the main focus of Android was the development of a system for digital cameras, but everything changed with the arrival of smartphones.

The success of HTC Dream, in 2008, which was equipped with Android, led the company to follow a new direction and, currently, 81% of smartphones in the world are Android.

Google Chrome

Born in 2008, the Google Chrome it was definitely one of the biggest highlights in Google’s history. Today the leader in the global browser market, Chrome is an open-source browser and, in just 3 years, took the throne from Internet Explorer as the most used browser in the world.

Based on Chromium, the project that also serves as the foundation for browsers like Opera, Edge, and Brave, Google Chrome stands out for its versatility and extensive extension store. 

Despite the positive points, Chrome is possibly the biggest point of controversy for Google: there are several real concerns about the privacy and user data collection.

Bard

The most popular and recent tool from Google is the Bard. As expected, the tech giant could not stay out of the artificial intelligence race and, after the success of ChatGPT, launched its own AI language model.

In opposition to ChatGPT, Google promised to equip Bard with more capabilities and access to updated information, through the search power of your search engine. 

The goal of Google is to integrate its artificial intelligence tool into all its resources and applications, however, it is impossible to know if this instrument will be a success, since it was only launched in March 2023.