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Key Takeaways

  • Google Search has powerful competitors, like Bing and DuckDuckGo, each offering unique benefits.
  • Choosing the best alternative depends heavily on your priorities as a user.
  • Hands-on testing is the best way to determine whether an alternative search engine truly suits your needs.

Google Search is likely your default search engine, like billions of other internet users worldwide. But since Google is so commonplace, you might not know the other great internet search options better suited to you—and why you should start using them immediately.

1. Bing: Vibrant, Personalized Google Alternative

The Microsoft Bing Search Engine Homepage

When considering a change from Google, Microsoft's Bing offers a vibrant visual experience worth exploring. Its welcoming interface loads with colorful dedicated tabs for easily searching images, news, videos, and maps with just a click.

Trending news headlines below provide a glimpse of popular searches. And the Copilot button next to the logo lets you chat with an AI assistant directly from results. Who doesn't enjoy refining queries through friendly conversation over endless filters?

Bing also takes functionality further by linking searches to your Microsoft account. Imagine redeeming earned reward points for gift cards, sweepstakes entries, or charitable donations.

Likewise, the Collections feature helps you organize your research and plans in an accessible way. You can customize your public Bing profile similarly to Google's People cards, linking it to display social media updates from your connected accounts.

Page displaying the Microsoft Bing Profile Tab, along with the Search History and Collections Tabs

Managing your privacy and search data is simple through Bing's safe search settings and options to filter results by location or entirely clear your history. When using the built-in Microsoft Copilot feature, you control how frequently your chat responses appear directly in your search results.

The search experience on Bing stands out through personalized recommendations and highlights on specific pages displayed via a lightbulb icon.

Bing Engine Search Results page displaying results for a money bag query

Give Bing a try for a more vivid take on search with additional perks through your Microsoft account.

2. DuckDuckGo: Privacy-Focused Search Experience

The DuckDuckGo Search Engine Homepage

Want a search engine that puts privacy front and center? DuckDuckGo is an excellent Google alternative.

DuckDuckGo offers a clean, simplified homepage featuring a search bar and settings toggle. Upon entering a search query, results are organized into convenient tabs for Images, Videos, News, and Maps. Filters like Safe Search, Region, and more appear above to help refine your search. At the same time, Instant Answers for common queries like weather or currency conversions are displayed prominently at the top.

DuckDuckGo Engine Search Results page displaying results for a money bag query

Settings like URL placement, font, and language can be applied via the settings menu to customize your search experience. If you toggle Infinite Scroll on, your results will expand smoothly as you scroll rather than paginate, requiring you to tap More Results.

Perhaps most importantly, DuckDuckGo never stores your search or browsing history, IP addresses, or other personal data. Search results are truly anonymous, providing a reassuring layer of privacy that major players like Google cannot claim.

For a refreshingly simple yet powerful search with genuine privacy at its core, DuckDuckGo is worth making the switch. Give it a try on both desktop and mobile to experience search without strings attached.

3. Brave Search: An Independent Search Engine

The Brave Search Engine Homepage

While other search engines rely on third-party indexes like Google and Bing, Brave Search has achieved a unique milestone—operating with 100% independence. By growing its index through users' anonymous contributions via the Brave Web Discovery Project, it provides fully private and independent search results.

Brave claims to have amassed over 22 million average daily searches, making it the fastest-growing search engine since Bing. This rapid adoption enabled the search team to improve the search results competitively.

This sets Brave Search apart from alternatives powered behind the scenes by the APIs of Big Tech companies. Now processing searches almost exclusively from its own index, Brave users receive fully independent results without compromising privacy.

The minimal search homepage focuses on your query, with only the logo, search bar, and Brave browser download button. Powerful filters like location, time, and safe search, along with the Goggles feature, allow customized filtering of your query results.

Brave Engine Search Results page displaying results for a money bag query

And just like DuckDuckGo, an Answer panel on the right curates important details about your search topic for easy scanning. Beyond the main results, sections for Images, News, Videos, and related Reddit Discussions provide added context. Alternatives like Google and Bing are also reachable with a single tap if needed.

The Find Elsewhere Tab in the search results displayed by Brave

Brave Search is the leading independent alternative for privacy-preserving searches delivered from a controllable (kind of) source.

4. Swisscows: Family-Friendly Search Engine

The Swisscows Search Engine Homepage

Searching while maintaining privacy and safety for all ages is a priority with Swisscows. As an alternative focused solely on protecting users, Swisscows ensures a child-friendly environment free of inappropriate content.

Its homepage allows easy installation as your browser's default search engine. Results are then carefully filtered to block disturbing or graphic queries, clearly informing users of an Error 450 because of blocked topics.

swisscows search engine blocking rude word search

Additional sections organize the search results for web, image, video, and music. Helpful date filters also keep findings up-to-date. You can preview the results before opening them fully. In the preview, you'll be shown the number of trackers on the page.

Swisscows takes privacy a step further by anonymizing all queries within seven days so families can search confidently. Essentially, they don't collect or store your personally identifiable information during your searches. However, it stores the search entries you enter, although they claim searches aren't linked to you. After seven days, the query data are completely anonymized, so they can't be traced back to you.

A one-stop shop, Swisscows also offers safe messaging, email, and VPN apps to bolster online protection for all ages on any device. Donations also support humanitarian causes.

If maintaining a family-safe space online during daily searches is important, Swisscows delivers the most discreet, carefully filtered alternative for every household member.

5. Ecosia: Eco-Friendly Search Engine

Ecosia Engine Search Results page displaying results for a money bag query

Ecosia stands out as a search engine devoted to reforestation through user searches. Its simple homepage invites you to make Ecosia your default search engine with just a click while also providing abundant information on its tree-planting initiatives.

Clicking the tree icon on the search page will display a running tally of trees you've helped plant. Ecosia says searches and ad revenue directly support large-scale reforestation projects worldwide.

Results include dedicated sections for Images, News, and more. Filters like location and date help you whittle down your search results, and the Ecosia AI assistant is available if you need more help.

Beyond search, you can use Ecosia to identify polluters and eco-friendly organizations via a green leaf and fossil fuel icon, climate pledge ratings, and environmental impact evaluations. Search and browse and see for yourself how easy it can be to help our planet.

Which Google Search Alternative Should You Go For?

Whether focused on privacy, customization options, or simplicity, each of the Google Search alternatives covered offers a useful twist on search.

The right choice ultimately comes down to your priorities. Do you value maximizing privacy above all else? Try DDG. Prefer an interface stripped of distractions? Try Brave. Only by considering what truly matters most to you in a search companion will you determine which engine deserves a chance against your usual option—Google, duh.

Give one or more of the solutions covered here a try to see if they can meet or exceed your expectations. You may find that an option previously sat just outside your awareness perfectly matches your needs.