Browse means to look through things casually, without searching for anything specific. When you browse at a bookstore, you wander the aisles picking up books that catch your eye, flipping through pages, maybe reading a chapter here and there. You're not hunting for a particular title: you're exploring to see what interests you.

The word originally described how deer and other animals feed, nibbling leaves and twigs from different plants as they move through the forest. That sense of moving from one thing to another, sampling a bit here and there, carried over to how we use it today.

You can browse through a magazine at the doctor's office, browse the shelves at a library, or browse a museum looking at whatever exhibits seem interesting. Online, people browse websites by clicking from page to page, following their curiosity rather than having a fixed destination in mind.

Browsing feels different from searching. When you search, you know what you want and you're trying to find it. When you browse, you're open to discovering something unexpected. A student researching wolves for a report is searching for information, but that same student browsing the nature section might stumble across a fascinating book about octopuses instead.