Alphabet was created in 2015 as the parent company of Google.
The restructuring separated Google’s core internet businesses from several newer ventures. Google remained the largest and best-known company under Alphabet, while projects such as Waymo and Verily became more independent subsidiaries.
Google itself began in 1998, founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they were students at Stanford University. Its search engine became the foundation for advertising products that generated most of the company’s revenue.
A common mix-up is treating Alphabet and Google as interchangeable names. Google is the operating company and brand behind search, YouTube, Android, and other products; Alphabet is the publicly traded parent company formed later.