BackRub
BackRub was the original name of the research project by Larry Page and Sergey Brin at Stanford University that later became Google.
Reviewed by Alexander Yarovenko · Updated: 2026-06-21
What was BackRub?
BackRub was a web search engine research project developed by Larry Page and Sergey Brin at Stanford University in 1996. The project analyzed the web's link structure — specifically, the "back links" pointing to any given page — to determine a site's importance. This was the foundation for what is now known as PageRank.
Why "BackRub"?
The name came from the project's focus on back links (inbound links pointing back to a page). By counting and weighing these links, the algorithm could assess a page's authority and relevance — a revolutionary idea at the time, when most search engines ranked purely by keyword frequency.
From BackRub to Google
- 1996 — BackRub begins crawling the web from Stanford servers
- 1997 — Page and Brin rename the project "Google" (a play on "googol", 10¹⁰⁰)
- 1998 — Google Inc. is incorporated in a Menlo Park garage
- 2023 — Google processes ~8.5 billion searches per day
Why BackRub Matters for SEO
The core insight from BackRub — that links are votes of trust — remains the foundation of Google's ranking algorithm. Link building, domain authority, and E-E-A-T all trace their roots back to the BackRub concept. Understanding this history explains why earning quality backlinks from authoritative sites remains one of the most impactful SEO activities.