map of the most popular internet search engines
Map of the most popular search engines 2024 (data for Q1 2024 / StatCounter.com)
My ranking includes 14 search engines that are the most popular among users, as well as those that stand out from other competitors and generate greater interest from different groups of Internet users.
The most popular search engines in 2024 on the global market are Google with a 91.5% share. In second place on the podium is Bing with a 3.35% share, and in the lowest place we find Yandex with a 1.75% share. Also worth mentioning are the search engines Yahoo! (1.09%) and Baidu (0.87%).
popular internet search engines in the world in 2024
The world's most popular search engines (Q1 2024 / StatCounter.com)
The ranking of the most popular internet search engines in the world is of course opened by Google, which has been the undisputed leader of the rankings for many years. The service enjoys huge popularity not only in Poland, but all over the world. According to StatCounter, in the first quarter of 2024, it was used by 91.5% of all internet users worldwide. Why is the Google search engine considered the best by such a large number of people?
Many Internet users also choose Google because it has the largest number of indexed websites and is available in almost all countries of the world. The history of the Google search engine dates back to 1996, when Larry Page and Sergej Brine, as part of a student project, began working on a new method of searching based on the analysis of relationships between websites. This algorithm was named PageRank.
Launched in 1998, the google.com website quickly began to gain popularity. This meant that by 2004, the company controlled 80% of the global market. Interestingly, at the beginning of the development of the PageRank algorithm, the creators wanted to sell their idea to Yahoo! for a modest million dollars, but the company was not interested in such a purchase. Looking at the position of both search engines, there is no doubt that the potential of PageRank was huge and Yahoo! had a chance to make a huge step forward. It is hard to imagine what the market would look like if students in 1998 had found a buyer for their work. However, we can be sure that many users today cannot imagine using any other search engine.
Google logo
Google logo
Google's huge advantage over other competitors on the market is reminiscent of a Formula 1 race, in which one of the drivers has a few dozen seconds' advantage over the rest of the field fighting for the remaining positions.
This does not mean that Google is the only choice - some users use competitive solutions, if only because they want to maintain greater privacy on the web. In addition to standard search, Google offers, among others, image and voice search, as well as a number of other tools such as the Chrome browser, Google Ads services , Google Analytics, maps, Google My Business cards , YouTube videos and much more.
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Bing
The search engine owned by Microsoft ranks second both in Poland and worldwide. Initially, it was part of the MSN portal as MSN Search, and joined the group of independent Internet search engines on June 1, 2009. Bing is the default search engine on Windows computers that have Edge, a Microsoft product, as their built-in browser.
Bing-Logo
Bing-Logo
Bing is constantly developing and is based on proven solutions, which means that it features similar functionalities and is even similar in appearance to Google. Bing currently offers image search, video search and a map service. Microsoft has strengthened its cooperation with OpenAI, which has resulted in a number of innovations in the field of artificial intelligence and technology integration. A key element of this cooperation is the integration of the Bing search engine with ChatGPT in 2023, which allows for the use of advanced natural language generation functions, thanks to which users can get more natural answers to queries. According to statista.com, the bing.com website was visited over 1.3 billion times in the last month of 2023.
Yandex
Yandex-logo
Yandex-Logo
The Yandex search engine, or "Yet Another iNDEXer", is very popular in the Russian Federation, where at the beginning of 2024, according to StatCounter, it was used by 70.94% of Internet users, which is 1.75% of the global share and places Yandex in third place in the ranking of the most popular search engines. Interestingly, at the beginning of the 21st century, a Polish version of the search engine was also created, but it was closed due to lack of interest. The Russian-Dutch company offers facebook database image and video search, a map service, a translator, Yandex Disk and a free tool for measuring traffic. The authors are not afraid to implement interesting and innovative solutions that distinguish the tools offered by Yandex from the competition. The Yandex Internet search engine operates outside of Russia in Belarus, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Turkey.
Yahoo!
Yahoo! logo
Yahoo! Logo
Yahoo! is a global player that is achieving worse and worse results year after year. Yahoo!'s history dates back to 1994, but due to bad decisions made by not necessarily the right people in management positions, it has missed many good opportunities to shake up the search engine market. In 2009, Yahoo! was used by almost 6% of all users, and today the tool has lost popularity and is only slightly over 1%. A few years ago, Microsoft announced its intention to buy Yahoo!, but the transaction ultimately fell through. Finally, in 2016, the search engine became the property of Verizon Media, which also owns AOL - another legend on the media market.
Yahoo! is popular in Japan, where it has 12.27% of users, and in the United States, where it has over 2.3% of the market share. However, these are values that continue to decline year by year.
Baidu
One of the two countries where the Google search engine does not occupy the first place is the People's Republic of China. The Chinese version of the Google search engine was blocked in 2010 because the Mountain View company did not strictly adhere to the conditions imposed by the Chinese government. In 2018, there were reports of the company working on the DragonFly search engine, which was supposedly censorship-friendly, for which the American company fell under a wave of criticism. Google's share of the Chinese market in 2024 is a paltry 4.75% and concerns a small number of people who use VPNs in Hong Kong, which is not subject to censorship due to its separate legal system. The Bing search engine, which is in 3rd place in terms of popularity, has a better result than Google in China. Second place in Q1 2024 went to the Sogou search engine.
Baidu logo
Baidu Logo
The leader on the local market was the Baidu search engine, created in 2000 and available only in Chinese. In addition to standard search, Baidu also allows voice and image search. Baidu is used by almost half a billion users, which gives it 4th place in the world. The search engine meets the requirements of the Chinese government, which means it blocks all results related to queries about freedom of speech, human rights and people fighting for them, democracy, the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989 and much more.
DuckDuckGo
DuckDuckGo is a search engine that many believe was created “to spite Google” and, as we have seen in the charts above, is gaining increasing popularity in Poland. It stands out above all for its approach to privacy. Right after entering the DDG website, we receive the following message:
“Unlike Chrome and other browsers, we don’t track you.”
DuckDuckGo logo
DuckDuckGo Logo
The service blocks ad tracking scripts, allows you to keep your search history private, and allows you to have control over your data. DuckDuckGo has implemented some of the solutions used in the Yahoo! search engine. It has a user-friendly interface and does not share any user information with third parties.
The actions of the largest companies in recent years have drawn the attention of many Internet users about privacy and data security, which is why DuckDuckGo is becoming an increasingly popular search engine. DDG's market share in Q1 2024 based on StatCounter in the world is 0.53%, which places the browser in 6th place. Interestingly, in the United States alone, it is used by about 2% of users. According to statistics published on the duckduckgo.com website, the search engine handles about 3 billion queries per month.
Ask
Ask.com logo
Ask.com Logo
Ask.com was launched in 1996 as "Ask Jeeves" - a virtual concierge that allowed users to get answers to questions asked in their everyday language. The search engine largely relied on providing answers to questions asked by us, which were answered by other users. Today, it is used by about 50 million users worldwide each month. It is most popular in the US, Japan and the UK. Some of us may associate Ask.com with a negative side. This is all due to the Ask Toolbar, which often installed itself on our computers without our knowledge. Removing it often caused a lot of problems, which also contributed to the loss of many users. In 2010, Ask.com withdrew from the search engine market, and search results are provided by Google.
AOL Search
AOL-Logo
AOL Logo
One of the largest Internet service providers is AOL (formerly America Online), whose history dates back to 1983. The company's heyday fell on the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries - then AOL took over Time Warner for 165 billion dollars and was one of the media giants. In recent years, it has not only lost many customers, but has also been loudly criticized for its ideas that hit customers' wallets, cooperation with China on the issue of internet censorship, as well as a large "leak" of data in 2006. It was caused by AOL itself, in fact consciously sharing the queries of about 650 thousand users of its search engine with third parties. In 2007, AOL launched a service in Polish, but it was closed in 2010 due to low interest?. Since 2015, AOL Search, like Yahoo!, has belonged to Verizon.
Qwant
Qwant logo
Qwant Logo
Another search engine that states right from the start that it respects the privacy of its users. Qwant prides itself on the fact that its privacy policy is very transparent - they collect but do not share or sell data. The search engine, based on Bing, was launched in 2013 in France and is currently used by almost 50 million users per month. Like DuckDuckGo, it is one of the first choices for people who are tired of having their online activities tracked and their data transferred to other entities.
Ecosia
Ecosia logo
Ecosia Logo
Ecosia is, in short, a search engine that plants trees - more precisely, Internet users who use it contribute to financing the reforestation of more areas around the world. It uses search results provided by Microsoft, and a portion of the income is transferred to planting trees. It takes about 45 searches to plant one tree somewhere in the world. After entering the home page, we can see that thanks to the activity of the search engine users, over 120 million trees have already been planted. Ecosia is certainly the right search engine for people who are not indifferent to ecology and high carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere.
DogPile
DogPile logo
DogPile Logo
We’ve already had an eco-friendly search engine on the list, so now it’s time for a service that helps animals. Dogpile was created by Aaron Flin in 1996. It uses information provided by Google, Yahoo! and Bing, and the profits go to support animal charities.
Wolfram Alpha
Wolfram Alpha logo
Wolfram Alpha Logo
Wolfram Alpha is a search engine created in 2009 that, like Ask, answers queries in natural language. It also supports mathematical language, which means it can replace an advanced calculator in performing calculations or solving more complicated equations.
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Seznam logo
Logo Seznam
The penultimate service presented is Seznam, the most popular (right after Google) search engine in the Czech Republic, where it was launched in 1996. The last time Seznam could boast a larger number of users was in October 2009. StatCounter data from early 2024 indicates that it currently has over 12.1% share of the Czech market, which is 0.5% better than last year. Initially, the site served as a simple catalog of websites, and now provides news, dictionaries, maps, weather forecasts and runs over 15 different online services.
