Items where two or more keywords are present

Enter the keywords with a space between them

new DVD player

returns items with all three words in the title in any order

Items containing certain words in a particular order

Place quotation marks around the group of words

"New York "

returns items with titles containing New York in that order only, but not those containing just New or just York or the words York New

Items that don't contain a certain word

Place a minus sign immediately before the word to be excluded (no space after the minus sign)

shirt blue –wool

returns items with titles containing the words shirt and blue but not containing the word wool

Items that don't contain several words

Place a minus sign before the list of words separated by commas (with no spaces after the minus sign and the commas) and put in brackets

bowl -(black,green,purple) or bowl –black –green –purple

returns items with titles containing the word bowl but not containing the words black, green, and purple

Items where one word or another is present

Enter keywords in brackets separated by commas (no space after the commas)

(shoulder bag,handbag)

returns items whose titles contain either the word shoulder bag or handbag

Items that contain words starting with a particular sequence of letters

Enter the letter sequence followed by an asterisk

book*

returns items whose titles contain words starting with book, such as books, bookshelf, and bookmark

Items that contain only a specific spelling of a word

Note: In some cases, eBay expands your search to include a plural and/or an alternative spelling of your search word(s). For example, if you were searching for book, you would receive search results with items containing the keyword book or the keyword books. Searching for grey would bring back items containing the keyword grey or the keyword gray. Use this command when you want an exact match.

Enter the keywords or phrases in quotes

"book"

returns only items with the exact word book and not items with the word books

Items that match the exact words

Note: In some cases, eBay expands your search to include items based on the intent of your search automatically, rather than matching the exact keywords provided.

If you do not want eBay to do this, then all you need to do is to put quotation marks around one of your keywords. For example, if you were searching action DVDs, you might type the keywords action DVD. This may bring back items that have both keywords action and DVD, as well as items that have the keyword action and are in the DVD category. If you entered "action" DVD, your results would include only items with the exact keywords action DVD and not the additional items in the DVD category with only the keyword action. Use this command when you want to match exact words.

Place quotes around any single keyword

"action” DVD
returns only items with the exact word action and DVD

action “DVD”
returns only items with the exact word DVD and the word action.