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a look at independent and privacy-respecting search engines
Anyone who has hung around me online long enough probably knows I am a big advocate for internet privacy, software freedom, and things like that. You probably know that I run de-googled Android devices and independent web browsers, so it shouldn't come as much of a surprise that I also advocate for and use private, independent search engines.
Naturally, this is going to exclude search engines such as Google and Bing, as they aren't what can be really be described as "privacy-friendly". However, we will go over some of the alternative search engines along with some of the ones I like and use on a daily basis, and see how they stack up. Perhaps this will even get you thinking about your search engine of choice, if you are still on Google or Bing or one of these bigger search engines that are known not to be so private.
I have went through, found, and tested out some of the biggest privacy-respecting search engines and added them to this list to look at. I have also added in one or two that might not be so well-known, but that I use for being privacy-respecting and independent, and that I'd like to see gain more traction.
DuckDuckGo (you might also see me refer to it as DDG for short in places) probably doesn't need much of an introduction, as it is probably the most well-known privacy-focused search engine. Even if you haven't used it much, I'm sure most people have at least heard of it by this point. DuckDuckGo has begun to reach the point where people ask me about it, instead of me mentioning it to them. My mother-in-law, who is in her seventies, actually found DuckDuckGo on her own and installed it on her phone, so they're doing something right when it comes to getting the word out about their search engine.
Of course, it helps that DuckDuckGo has been in the game for quite awhile now. DuckDuckGo has become so well-known in the search scene that it is now easy to use on any browser, as it is usually listed in the search engine selection list of most modern browsers. Even Chrome includes it in the list of selectable search engines that can be used besides Google!
DuckDuckGo also has "bangs", or a little feature where you can redirect your search elsewhere if you need to with a simple little keyword switch. For example, if you wanted to use Google to search for "linux" from within a DDG search, you'd type !g linux.
One of the few things some privacy purists might not like is that DuckDuckGo uses Bing on the backend to get a good deal of results. This is a double-edged sword for me. DDG is the privacy-friendly search engine I use that gives me the best local results, for example - if I am looking for a business in my town, and want to see the little information widget about it. It achieves this largely due to pulling some of that information from Bing - but at the same time, you still have to interact with Bing in some way. :P
Brave Search is a slightly newer search engine, brought to us by the same team that makes the Brave browser. It has always aimed to be a private search engine, and while it used to have some reliance on Bing APIs, as of 2023 it has been using its own index.
I tend to switch between Firefox and Brave when on my machines and phone, so I tend to use Brave Search quite a bit when on the Brave browser, and I also have it set as a selectable search engine in Firefox. The quality of Brave Search results has gone up quite a bit over the last little while, and I find myself using it more and more lately. The AI-generated summaries are actually pretty decent compared to Google's take on the same concept, and the results are usually very well-matching my query. Weather results in Brave Search are very good, with a useful and interactive weather widget being present for you to look at data about the weather in whatever area you are searching for.
Brave Search also has Goggles, which are sort of custom selective filters you can apply to your search results. Say you'd prefer to prioritize results from certain sources, like your favorite gaming site, or your preferred news source. Goggles make it easy to set these kinds of custom parameters in your search results. I have a few custom Goggles applied to my Brave search settings right now.
The main places I think Brave Search can improve is in its image results and in its local results, such as when I am looking up a restaurant in my town. It will show me links to local restaurants just fine (or to their tripadvisor links...ugh), but it would be cool to have a DDG-style widget that shows everything in a little information bubble, such as website link, hours, phone number, all that good stuff.
Startpage is another one that has been around for awhile, and probably doesn't need much of an introduction to people who have experience in exploring private search engines.
Startpage is a bit of a more private version of Google. You see, it doesn't have its own index, much like most of the other search engines on this list which rely on retreiving results from the backend of a bigger provider such as Bing. Startpage relies on Google results, but cleans them up and presents them in a much more privacy-friendly package.
As mentioned, instead of pulling results from Bing, Startpage pulls results from Google. It also doesn't store personal data or search history, runs unprofiled results (meaning the same results will be delivered to any user searching for the same query), IP addresses are removed by servers managed by Startpage, and there is even an "Anonymous View" where you can view results through a proxy to better hide your identity.
While Startpage isn't "fully independent", it is a fine search engine that does a good job on privacy, and is one I use and recommend, especially if you want Google-level results without the, well, Google.
Based in France, Qwant is a search engine that has been around since 2013.
Once much more reliant on the Bing API to return results, Qwant has been moving in a positive direction towards independence and using its own search index, like a few other engines on this list. Working to increase their indexing capabilities, Qwant claims to have exceeded 50% independence in web searches. A good amount of results still come from Bing for things like images.
Qwant is a private search engine, and it has some handy tools to help you control your search experience. One thing it allows you to do is to filter out adult content, for example, if you are using a work machine and don't want to see NSFW content, or if you are setting up Qwant on a kids' device, this feature could come in handy. It also offers the ability to add news to the homepage, set dark mode, and more.
Using Qwant for general searches, the results are very good. I got the results I expected I would, and found even more interesting ones that I hadn't seen before. For things like local searches ("$my_town restaurants"), I got decent results, but still no side panel widgets that show information on various businesses like you'd see in DDG, Google, or Bing. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it is something I look for from time to time, as I try to approach things from the perspective of a "normie" who is used to seeing these widgets in the "Big Tech" search engines.
All in all, I think Qwant is a good search engine, and a solid choice, and I look forward to seeing it evolve as it continues to trend more in the direction of its own search independence.
Mojeek is one of the interesting ones on this list, as it is a truly independent search engine that doesn't have any reliance on anything outside of its own index.
Using Mojeek, it feels fast. Searches return results quickly, and while there aren't as many results as you'd get from something like Google or Bing, they are usually good results, and get me where I need to go. Local searches, like some others on the list, aren't exactly the best, and get me returning to DDG sometimes, but for general searches, Mojeek is usually very good.
I love that Mojeek is a truly indie search engine and has been around for quite a long time. It is clear that Mojeek cares about privacy, and their privacy policy is short to read and simple to understand. Mojeek doesn't store cookies (unless you ask it to), it implements no tracking of users, and it uses no third-party search providers for its results. This reliance on its own index is what makes it a truly independent search engine, much like Brave Search.
I really like the mission of Ecosia. It is aiming to provide a good, private search experience, while also doing something good for the world - planting trees.
I care about the environment, and doing what I can to help it. That's why when I found Ecosia a few years ago, their mission resonated with me right away. Ecosia claims that 100% of their profits go towards climate action, with the majority of the income going towards planting trees in various parts of the world. Ecosia also powers its search infrastructure with solar energy, which is really cool. I also like that they are transparent with their revenue and where it goes by providing their financial reports.
There is only one thing I don't love about Ecosia, but it is something shared by a lot of search engines on this list - that is its reliance on outside APIs. In their privacy statement, Ecosia mentions that they use "Bing or Google to provide you with search results and ads". While I'd prefer every search engine used their own index for competitive and privacy reasons, I understand that not every search engine is going to have this ability, and I am glad they are upfront about the search providers they use on the backend so that users can make informed decisions.
This one doesn't serve as a "serious" search engine, like one you'd use to try to find local results or purchase a concert ticket for tomorrow or something like that. No, Wiby is something a little special and unique. Wiby is a "small-web" search engine.
Wiby indexes things like minimal, personal, HTML-only sites, things that might throw you back to the web design style of the 90s and early 2000s. It's what my sites look like, for the most part, and a ton of personal websites can be found with Wiby that document people's thoughts on everything from programming, to music, to random fandoms (I made a rhyme), science, religion, etc. Just like the web of the old days!
The Wiby homepage has a little "surprise me!" button underneath the search bar. Click it, and you will be taken to a random website indexed by Wiby. It is fun to click on it sometimes and find new sites. I've found a few interesting ones that I ended up bookmarking just from doing that a few times while bored.
Another fun thing about the Wiby search engine is that it is open-source, and anyone can host their own instance of it. I have thought about doing that sometime, would be a fun project.
These are some great search engines you should consider giving a try with. Each of these have their strengths and weaknesses, but they all have the same thing in common - they care about privacy, instead of collecting data and making profits off of your searches online. Consider trying them out and making your favorite among them your default search for a week - you might find that you like it a bit better than the results you're getting from Google and Bing these days, with the sponsored ad results and the AI-generated results all over the place.
If you found a privacy-respecting search engine I'm not aware of and haven't listed here, please contact me and let me know about it, or mention it to me on the fediverse or nostr. I will be sure to check it out and add a link to it here.