Miss the ’90s? Now You Can Search Old-School GIFs Like a Pro

The Internet Archive has just upgraded its vintage GIF search engine, GifCities, making it much easier for early internet culture enthusiasts to unearth forgotten ’90s classics. 

The tool, first launched in 2016, allows users to pick through a vast library of GIFs contained in old Geocities websites. For readers under 40, Geocities was at one point in the ’90s the world’s most popular web hosting service, giving users a free platform to create numerous, often cringeworthy (in hindsight) websites, with what’s now a distinct retro aesthetic. The service shut down in 2009, though it lived on in some countries like Japan. 

The upgrade, first spotted by Engadget, means that users will now be able to search the vast archive of content for GIFs using keywords, whereas before users were limited to file names. Users will also be able to search by file dimensions, for example, 150×20, for the first time. 

In addition, in a win for doomscrollers everywhere, the tool now includes “pagination,” meaning results are divided up by page numbers, rather than appearing as an unbroken roll of scrollable text. The tool also now allows you to share your vintage finds with friends and family by making custom webcards of GifCities GIFs and inspirational text, like “Hang in There” or “The Web is Yours for the Making.” 

GIF preservation might not seem like the most urgent pursuit to many. But GifCities has already been leveraged in all sorts of creative ways. 

GifCities-sourced GIFs cropped up in New York Times coverage of the British royal wedding in 2018, while a 2016 art exhibition at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, “GifCollider,” was dedicated to visuals from that period in internet history.

About Will McCurdy

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I’m a reporter covering weekend news. Before joining PCMag in 2024, I picked up bylines in BBC News, The Guardian, The Times of London, The Daily Beast, Vice, Slate, Fast Company, The Evening Standard, The i, TechRadar, and Decrypt Media.

I’ve been a PC gamer since you had to install games from multiple CD-ROMs by hand. As a reporter, I’m passionate about the intersection of tech and human lives. I’ve covered everything from crypto scandals to the art world, as well as conspiracy theories, UK politics, and Russia and foreign affairs.

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