Kids now say 'search it up' instead of 'Google it' as AI chatbots reshape information-seeking

The article reports that a generational shift in slang—away from 'Google it' toward phrases like 'search it up'—is tracking a larger change in how young people actually find information online. Rather than using Google Search, young people are increasingly turning to AI chatbots as their primary tool for answering questions. This linguistic change is meaningful because it reflects genuine behavioral change. 'Google' became a verb across generations precisely because Google Search was the default first stop when someone needed to look something up; the dominance of that tool embedded itself in casual language. Now, as AI chatbots offer an alternative way to get answers—potentially faster or more conversational—young people are adopting different language to describe the action. 'Search it up' is more generic and does not tie the behavior to a specific company, which better reflects a world in which the answer engine is no longer assumed to be Google. The article does not quantify how widespread this shift is, when it began, or which AI platforms young people are using, but it identifies the change as real enough to register in everyday speech and signals a meaningful reversal in default information-seeking behavior.

The article frames this change as a linguistic marker of a larger behavioral transition. For decades, 'Google' became so dominant as a search tool that it entered casual speech as a verb—shorthand for 'look something up online.' That generational dominance depended on Google being the default first stop when someone needed an answer. The emergence of AI chatbots as a faster or more intuitive way to get answers has fractured that monopoly on information-seeking behavior, and language is following practice: if you're no longer 'Googling' but instead talking to an AI, the old verb no longer describes what you're doing. The article's framing suggests this is not merely slang evolution for its own sake, but rather evidence that a younger cohort has already begun making different choices about which tools they reach for first—a shift with real consequences for companies whose business models depend on being that default destination.

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