Web Search Help

About SafeSearch

Use Google's SafeSearch filter if you don't want to see sites that contain pornography, explicit sexual content, profanity, and other types of hate content in your Google search results. While no filter is 100 percent accurate, SafeSearch checks a website's keywords and phrases, URLs, and Open Directory categories to determine and filter out inappropriate sites.

For more pointers on keeping your family safe on the Web, read Google's Tips for Online Safety.

Turning SafeSearch on

To turn the filter on for all your Google searches, follow these steps:

1. Visit the Google Preferences page.
2. In the SafeSearch Filtering section, choose the SafeSearch level you'd like to use:
   • Moderate filtering: This option excludes most explicit images from Google Images results but doesn't filter ordinary Web search results. This is your default SafeSearch setting; you'll receive moderate filtering unless you change it.
   • Strict filtering: This applies SafeSearch filtering to both image and Web search results.
   • No filtering: This option turns SafeSearch filtering off completely.
3. Click Save Preferences when you're done setting your preferences.

If you'd like to use a different level of SafeSearch filtering for a particular search, go to the Advanced Search page or the Advanced Image Search page to do your search.

SafeSearch should remain turned on as long as cookies are enabled on your computer. Learn more

Firewalls, proxies, and anti-virus programs are often configured to periodically delete cookies. If you are accessing Google from behind one of these programs, you may have to reset your preferences periodically.

If SafeSearch is turned on, but websites containing offensive content keep appearing in your search results, use the webpage removal request tool to report the site or image.