Google Scholar is an interface of Google that makes it easier to do academic research than is possible through the standard Google interface. It is designed to search for scholarly articles and case law, though it can also uncover books through Google Books.

Ways Google Scholar is better for academic research:

• Ranking of results is affected by number of citations, journal metrics, and author metrics
• You can more easily do advanced searching and filtering of your search results
• Citation indexing is a feature. (A technique that allows you to trace the use of an author's idea in an earlier document to others who have used, or "cited," it).
• Google Scholar allows you to track new results to your search and new citations to your articles

What Google Scholar Searches:

• Journal publisher websites
• Open Access repositories (university, discipline-based, and government)
• Preprint services
• Academic social networks
• Google Books
• Anything else Google thinks is hosting scholarly research

Be aware that because Google Scholar uses automatic indexing systems, non-scholarly sources can be indexed accidentally.