Search engines are the backbone of the internet as we know it. Can you imagine just how difficult life would be if all our questions weren’t just a Google search away?
Different search engines specialise in different things and hence in this article, we’re bringing you the top 10 search engines where you can find your answers.
Of course, Google was going to top this list. It’s the largest search engine in the world by quite some margin. Not only that, but it’s also much more than a search engine with its service expanding into cloud-based services, software and even hardware.
The term Google is actually a misspelling of the word ‘googol’ is a mathematical term meaning “10 raised to the power of 100” or 1 followed by 100 zeros.
Google also powers other search engines, including its own field-specific search engines such as Google Books and Google Scholar.
You can visit Google here
Bing
Google’s biggest competition and the second largest search engine on this list. The engine is powered by Microsoft and has stemmed out from older search engines like MSN Search and Windows Live Search.
While Bing is quite small as compared to Google, it still holds a respectable market share, at least when you take into account other alternatives to these two.
The engine offers various filters to make your searches more precise. You’re also greeted by a stunning background image and news briefs every time you open the homepage.
You can visit Bing here
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DuckDuckGo
DuckDuckGo is a well-known search engine among security experts and everyone else who doesn’t like being recorded while on the internet.
The search engine is all about privacy. It doesn’t store or track your search queries or browsing behaviour, which means no more personalised ads. It’s consistently growing and even has a Chrome extension to make switching easier.
You can visit DuckDuckGo here
Yahoo!
Another quite popular search engine, Yahoo falls next in line when talking search engines. It’s powered by Bing so the search results are actually quite similar.
Yahoo! was the rising start of search engines in the early 2000s. Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin even tried to sell Google to Yahoo for a mere $1,000,000 but Yahoo turned them down.
Later on, Yahoo’s services were beaten by the competition despite them having significantly more resources and quite the head start. Yahoo Mail was beaten by Gmail, Flicker was beaten by Instagram and Yahoo’s Answers was beaten by Quora.
Fun fact, Yahoo! stands for “Yet Another Hierarchical Organised Oracle.”
You can visit Yahoo! here
Also read: Top 7 Quora alternatives to find answers to your questions
Yandex
Yandex is a Russian search engine, which is also popular in Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Turkey. Yandex provides around 70 other services including cloud storage, email, and even a Google Translate alternative.
Unsurprisingly, Yandex has 40.21% market share in Russia as of November 2020. However, they were still trailing Google which was at 57.26%.
One of Yandex’s highlights is its ability to understand inflexions in the Russian language. You see, Russian is a complicated language where words can have more than 20 different endings to show their relation to others. This makes figuring out search queries quite the task.
You can visit Yandex here
Swisscows
Swisscows markets itself as being a family-friendly, semantic search engine. They’re also for the privacy-concerned, as they don’t collect, store or track any data from their users.
The search engine does however, use AI to guess what their users are going to be typing and as a result, you’ll find that your searches are surprisingly accurate.
You can visit Swisscows here
Also read: Top 10 websites to pick up a new skill
Ask
Ask is another search engine powered by Microsoft’s Bing. The site didn’t start as a search engine but an online question-answer forum much like a virtual concierge. However, in 2010, Ask simply couldn’t compete and dropped out of the market.
Now, the search engine is powered by Google.
You can visit Ask here
AOL
AOL, short for America Online started way back in 1985 and was one of the early pioneers of the internet back in the mid-1990s. Origianlly they provided dial-up services, a web portal, email and instant messaging.
However, with new players emerging in the market, AOL eventually turned it’s business model towards acquiring other brands such as TechCrunch in 2010 and The Huffington Post in 2011.
You can visit AOL here
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Seznam
Seznam was the Checz Republic’s leading search engine and web portal until Google came along.
Started in 1996 by Ivo Lukačovič in Prague, Seznam began as a simple search engine and online directory. By 2001, it had developed multiple new avenues such as TV programs, maps, weather forecasts as well as a news portal covering financial, sports and political news.
You can visit Seznam here
Ecosia
If you’re privacy orientated and are a looking for an alternative to DuckDuckGo for whatever reason, look no further, Ecosia has got you covered.
The search engine lives up to its name and uses the money it gets from advertising to plant trees around the world to benefit people and economies alike.
The homepage has a counter of the total number of trees they’ve planted so far.
You can visit Ecosia here
