--- title: "Which came first, Google or the World Wide Web?" description: "Google vs the World Wide Web: the World Wide Web came first, by 9 years — 1989 against 1998. What happened in each case." url: https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/google-vs-world-wide-web/ site: "At One Place" --- # Which came first, Google or the World Wide Web? **Which came first, Google or the World Wide Web?: the World Wide Web** 1989 — 9 years before Google the World Wide Web came first, by 9 years. Tim Berners-Lee wrote the proposal at CERN. ## Side by side | | Google | the World Wide Web | | --- | --- | --- | | Year | 1998 | 1989 | | Date | 1998-09-04 | — | | Category | technology | technology | | What happened | Google Inc. was incorporated in a garage in Menlo Park. | Tim Berners-Lee wrote the proposal at CERN. | ## Google The date used here is the incorporation, 4 September 1998. Two others compete: the research project called BackRub began at Stanford in 1996, and the google.com domain was registered on 15 September 1997. Google itself has celebrated its birthday on four different September dates over the years, which is a fair indication that no single one is correct. It is younger than Amazon, eBay and Netflix. ## the World Wide Web Berners-Lee circulated his proposal in March 1989, built the first browser and server by the end of 1990, and CERN put the software into the public domain in 1993. The Web is twenty years younger than the internet: the internet is the network, the Web is one service running on it, and email and file transfer both predate the Web by decades. The first website went live in December 1990 and is still online. ## Common questions ### Which came first, Google or the World Wide Web? the World Wide Web, by 9 years — 1989 against 1998. ### When did Google start? 1998. Google Inc. was incorporated in a garage in Menlo Park. ### When did the World Wide Web start? 1989. Tim Berners-Lee wrote the proposal at CERN. ## Related pages - [Microsoft or the World Wide Web?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/microsoft-vs-world-wide-web/) - [Apple or the World Wide Web?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/apple-vs-world-wide-web/) - [Apple or Google?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/apple-vs-google/) - [the internet (ARPANET) or the World Wide Web?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/arpanet-vs-world-wide-web/) - [the internet (ARPANET) or Google?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/arpanet-vs-google/) - [email or the World Wide Web?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/email-vs-world-wide-web/) - [email or Google?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/email-vs-google/) - [the Macintosh or the World Wide Web?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/macintosh-vs-world-wide-web/) - [Windows or the World Wide Web?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/windows-vs-world-wide-web/) - [the World Wide Web or YouTube?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/world-wide-web-vs-youtube/) - [Python or the World Wide Web?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/python-vs-world-wide-web/) - [Java or the World Wide Web?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/java-vs-world-wide-web/) ## Sources - Typical range compiled from manufacturer specifications — At One Place (/about/) - Wikidata — Wikimedia Foundation (https://www.wikidata.org/) [CC0 1.0]