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How does the meaning of underscores and dashes vary in URL? 

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How does the meaning of underscores and dashes vary in URL?

Whenever we see an underscore, Google joins that in URL, instead of separate using that. For an instance, if one say black dash love in a URL, Google considers dash as a separator. So, Google index the word black and Google index the word love. And it is separate. 

If you were to have First World War with underscores- so First World War- instead of separating it with underscore, gloom it together. So that's one term one could find by searching First underscore World underscore War. That sounds little weird. Reason why Google does it in this way is because they cared about precision. 

So, when you are a programmer, they wanted to be able to search for the programming terms. That is why because Google joined based on the underscore instead of having that act as a separator. 

Actually, it doesn't make much difference. It is sort of second order effect. It's not a primary thing, which really makes huge difference. For an instance, Wikipedia has lots of pages which says First underscore World underscore War. That does not keep it from ranking, as it has page rank, proximity and title.

If someone is going to start a new site, you have got a blank slate to work with, you must go with dashes at least for the foreseeable future. 

Google had thought to split on underscores some years ago. But it turns out the amount of impact it has in our rankings is relatively low. So, for now, Google joins on the underscore and separate on the dash. 

In simple words, if you already have website, which uses underscores and works the way you want, do not rewrite every single URL. If you are about to start a new website, you can opt for the dashes. Otherwise, if you have already decided to do it in underscore, it is not a big deal to worry about. 
 
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