On the internet, we can look up information that is not in one’s memory, but also information that is in one’s memory, but does not come immediately to mind. We become susceptible, therefore, to googling before trying to retrieve, which bypasses the benefits of “retrieval as a memory modifier” (Bjork, 1975), including that even a failed attempt to retrieve yet-to-be-learned information can potentiate learning of new information. Across four experiments, participants were asked to either generate answers to trivia questions before consulting the internet (thinking-before-googling), search for answers on the internet (googling-right-away), read questions and answers presented simultaneously (presented-with), or generate answers before being presented with answers (thinking-before-presented). Overall, thinking-before-googling led to better recall than did googling-right-away. Such a finding is striking in several respects, including that 81% of participants said they tended to immediately search the internet as opposed to thinking first.