Google Celebrates 27th Anniversary with Classic Logo on Front Page

Something's different on Google's homepage today, Saturday (September 27, 2025). The Google logo, which is usually modern, has now taken on a classic and old-fashioned appearance.  The old Google logo was the first one used by the company when it was founded 27 years ago. It was displayed to commemorate Google's 27th anniversary, which is today.  

"As we celebrate Google's birthday today, we remember Google's humble beginnings as a research project in a garage, proof that breakthrough moments can start in ordinary places," Google wrote on its official page.  

When the doodle is clicked, users are directed to various pieces of information related to Google, particularly about the company's anniversary, if they click on the google displayed today. The search engine is now over a quarter of a century old.

The search engine is now over a quarter of a century old. During that time, it has served as a window into information for many people worldwide.

Changed birthday several times 

The search engine company has changed its anniversary several times. A look at the Google doodle archives reveals that September 27th is Google's birthday. 

"On September 27, 1998, Google Inc. was officially born," Google stated on today's google archive page. However, if we examine the history of its founding, Google was officially incorporated as a company on September 4, 1998, according to its Wikipedia page. 

On its 5th anniversary, in 2003, Google celebrated its birthday on a different date, namely September 8th.

In 2004, when the company turned 6, the celebration was held again on September 7. A year later, the date of Google's birthday celebration changed again to September 26. 

Google initially celebrated its anniversary every September 7. That date is also referred to by Google as the company's founding date. A few years later, Google announced that it proposed the company's inauguration on September 4th. This date is what people still know as Google's birthday. 

However, since 2006, when Google turned eight years old, the celebration has been held on September 27. This date was chosen so that the company could simultaneously announce the achievement of successfully indexing a certain number of pages by its search engine at that time.

Today, Google's services extend beyond just search to encompass everything from email and browsers to navigation maps, and most recently, the artificial intelligence (AI)-based Gemini AI chatbot.

So, how did Google get started and how does it continue to exist today? Let's take a look back at Google's history.

Born in 1998 

The origins of Google services began in a room at Stanford University in the United States, where two students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, were working. 

The two first met in 1995. According to the About Google page, Larry Page was considering Stanford for graduate school at the time. Sergey Brin, who was studying there, was tasked with showing Larry around the campus. 

Long story short, the two became friends and even built a search engine together in their dorm room. The search engine, named "BackRub," used links to determine the importance of individual pages on the World Wide Web. 

However, investors apparently misspelled "Googol" as "Google." The name "Google" was eventually used on checks and various documents. This forced Page and Brin to use the name "Google" for their search engine, which remains the same to this day.

In August 1998, Sun co-founder Andy Bechtolsheim wrote a check for $100,000 to Page and Brin. Google LLC was officially founded on September 4, 1998. 

With investment from investors, Google formed a new team and began upgrading its office. Google moved from a dorm room to its first office, a garage in suburban Menlo Park, California.

The "landlord" of the garage is none other than Susan Wojcicki. Susan was Google's 16th employee. She served as CEO of YouTube from 2014 to 2023. She has now resigned from her position as CEO of YouTube. Susan charges US$1,700 a month for her garage. According to an inflation calculator, US$1,700 in 1998 is equivalent to about US$3,120 (approximately Rp 48.3 million) today. 

It was from Susan Wojcicki's garage that Google grew into one of the world's most valuable and giant technology companies. Google's headquarters are currently located at the Googleplex in Mountain View, California, United States. This Google office complex sits on 17 hectares of land.

Was rejected by Yahoo

Previously, Sergey and Larry planned to offer the "Google" prototype and algorithm to the technology company Yahoo and the US web portal Excite. The reason was simple: they were overwhelmed and wanted to focus on completing their studies.

This algorithm is called PageRank. PageRank serves to rank or order websites displayed in Google search results, based on their level of importance. At the time, Page and Brin were willing to sell Google for a "low" price of US$1 million, or around Rp 14 billion today. However, Yahoo rejected the offer.

Excite was also approached by Page and Brin, who offered to sell their hard-earned project for US$750,000, or approximately Rp 10.5 billion. However, Excite also declined, claiming the price was too high. Unsuccessful in selling Google, Page and Brin continued their project independently while pursuing their doctoral studies.

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