13 Privacy-Focused, Alternative Search Engines to Google

Google alternatives are everywhere, but are they anygood?

To answer this question, we researched a few popular alternative search engines. Our main judging criterion is how each search engine fared in its commitment to protecting user data and privacy.

Here are the ones that got our approval:

Startpage is effectively Google without the tracking.

According to the Netherlands-based search engine, your queries are anonymized before search results are pulled from Google. This means all identifying information is blanketed, including your IP address. No tracking cookies are used either.

Startpage also complies with GDPR, a European Union regulation that protects users’ data. Still, you should know the country is part of the Nine Eyes intelligence alliance, which shares mass surveillance data with eight countries.

Feature spotlight

The “Anonymous View” feature lets you visit websites from your search results anonymously for both desktop and mobile. It essentially behaves like a (free) VPN.

DuckDuckGo is easily the most well-known private search engine around—and the antithesis to Google when it comes to favoring user privacy.

Your search history is saved in a non-identifiable manner. This means tracking cookies and personal identifiers, such as IP addresses, are not stored.

Despite the fact that DuckDuckGo’s results are pulled from over 400 sources (including Microsoft’s Bing), DuckDuckGo assures its users that it doesn’t share any personal information withthem.

The same...