The search engine paid tribute to his famed poem My Love is Like a Red Red Rose by illustrating its usual multi-coloured logo with the drawing of a flower.
Web users who click on the logo are taken to a Google search result for Robert Burns.
Burns, whose poem Auld Lang Syne is traditionally sung around the globe to mark New Year, was born on January 25, 1759.
Thousands of Burns suppers will be held across the world tonight to commemorate his birth, with more being hosted in England than any other country.
His works have been translated into 120 languages and there are said to be more statues erected around the world in his honour than to any other literary figure.
However, he has faced repeated accusations, particularly south of the border, that his work has little literary merit.
Jeremy Paxman aroused controversy when his description of the poet as "no more than a king of sentimental doggerel" was included in the new edition of The Chambers Dictionary.
