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An Internet portal is a website that provides information from multiple sources and serves as a starting point for users. It includes links to common types of information and relies on search engines. Popular portals have categorized directories and news, weather, entertainment, and financial updates. Some portals are produced by internet providers or focused on specific topics. Mobile devices may perform portal functions through customizable menus.
An Internet portal is a website that contains information from multiple sources. It is designed to be the starting point for a user when going online and includes links to the most common types of information people are looking for. Virtually every Internet portal relies on a search engine of some sort.
Popular Internet portals contain categorized directories of major websites as well as news, weather, entertainment and financial updates. The idea is that users will visit such sites as a first stop when searching for information. In turn, it is hoped that users will use the company’s search engine if they search for an unrelated site from the Internet portal.
Most major search engines have their own Internet portals. Many use the same branding, but keep the portal on a separate site called Bing. Some still host their primary search tool within one portal, effectively providing two different ways to find information from the same site.
Some Internet portals are produced by a particular Internet provider. The best known was that of America Online, where at one point the portal was only accessible by subscribers via software rather than viewable as a public web page. Originally, AOL used a “walled garden” approach whereby only certain pages were accessible to subscribers rather than being able to use the entire Web. Typically, these pages were exclusive to AOL. During this time, the AOL portal was the only way for subscribers to navigate available online information.
It is also possible for an Internet portal to be focused on a specific topic or topic rather than the Internet as a whole. For example, many national governments have a single website that serves as a directory for individual departments or agencies. This means that a citizen can find government information if he is not familiar with the relevant department’s website or even if he is not sure which department is responsible for a particular topic.
With mobile devices, it is questionable whether the functions of an Internet portal are performed by the phone itself. Most smartphones will have menu buttons that perform the functions of a portal, such as links for reading an email account, checking the weather, or viewing stock prices. Compared to traditional internet portals, these menus can often be much more customizable, making them more user-friendly as unwanted information can be removed.
