If you’re looking for a search engine to use instead of Google, you’ve come to the right place.
By the end of this guide, you’ll know the best alternative search engines. And why each one might be a better fit.
Let’s get started.
1. Bing
Bing is a great alternative if you want a Google-like search experience enhanced with AI-enabled results powered by OpenAI.
Its standout feature is Copilot—a conversational AI assistant built directly into the Bing interface.
You’ll sometimes see Copilot responses directly in the search results, along with sources it referenced.
And you can go straight to Copilot answers from the homepage. Or from the Copilot tab at the top of results.
If you open a dedicated Copilot chat, you can click on follow-up prompts to explore the topic further.
And there’s a small bonus to using Bing: There’s a rewards program. Every query earns you points you can redeem for gift cards or donate to causes you care about.
Why I Think It’s a Great Google Alternative
I love Bing’s Copilot feature—it’s the main reason I use Bing.
When I tested Bing Copilot across 12 real queries (including “how to dispute a medical bill,” “best places to visit in california,” and “how to explain SEO to a beginner”) the follow-up prompts consistently matched what information I wanted to look into next.
Like these follow-up prompts for “how to explain seo to a beginner”:
It saved me time typing in additional queries and felt closer to a conversation than a search.
2. DuckDuckGo
DuckDuckGo is a reliable alternate search engine that doesn’t track your searches, store your history, or personalize results based on your browsing history.
You can even switch your location manually to tailor to different locations.
DuckDuckGo pulls results from its own crawler (DuckDuckBot) and trusted sources like Bing and Wikipedia.
It also offers helpful features like bangs (“!”)—shortcuts that let users search other sites (Reddit, Wikipedia, Amazon, GitHub) directly from the DuckDuckGo search bar.
In 2024, DuckDuckGo launched Duck.ai—a privacy-first AI chatbot that gives you access to several AI models, including GPT-4o mini, Claude 3 Haiku, and Llama 3.3 70B. And it anonymizes every query and stores recent chats only on your device (not the cloud).
Why I Think It’s a Great Google Alternative
I like that Duck.ai lets me choose an AI model before starting a chat without needing to sign in.
For instance, I used Claude 3 Haiku to draft a newsletter privacy policy. Then, I opened a new session with GPT-4o mini to rewrite it in a more professional tone.
Also, bangs are wildly underrated.
I searched “!amazon noise cancelling headphones” and went straight to Amazon’s results page.
It’s an easy way to quickly go where I want to look.
3. Yahoo
Yahoo combines a traditional search engine with a full-featured content hub.
When you land on the homepage, it feels more like a personalized dashboard than a plain search bar.
You get a mix of trending news, stock tickers, weather updates, and entertainment stories—all automatically curated.
And Yahoo offers dedicated sections like:
- Yahoo Finance: For stock tracking, company news, and market insights
- Yahoo Sports: For live scores, fantasy leagues, and player updates
- Yahoo Life: For content on wellness, lifestyle, and parenting
- Yahoo Mail: For sending and receiving emails
Search results are powered by Bing, so you get reliable answers for everyday queries.
You may occasionally see an AI-generated summary, but it’s not the focal point like it is for Google.
Why I Think It’s a Great Google Alternative
Yahoo stands out because of its homepage. It’s packed with curated content—news headlines, lifestyle stories, horoscopes, finance, weather, and even email access.
What I love is that it lets me search while I’m reading the news.
I was reading an article on Yahoo about taking vitamins when something caught my attention. Without leaving the page, I used the search bar at the top to look it up.
And since the results are powered by Bing, the quality is solid. Plus, the way Yahoo lays out results makes them easy to scan.
4. Wayback Machine
The Wayback Machine is unique in these search engine alternatives to Google in that its purpose is to let you see how different websites looked in the past.
It lets you access outdated or even deleted pages going all the way back to 1996.
Just enter a URL, and you can view past versions.
For example, here’s what the Semrush homepage looked like in 2014:
It also provides an ad-free experience with no tracking.
It’s a favorite among researchers, journalists, marketers, and anyone trying to fact-check or recover lost content.
Why I Think It’s a Great Google Alternative
I love the Wayback Machine as a research tool.
I wanted to see how ClickUp’s brand messaging has evolved since it was launched. And I wanted to review their homepage at the start of each year from 2017 to 2025.
So, I plugged ClickUp’s homepage URL into the Wayback Machine.
Here’s what their homepage looked when it was launched:
And here’s the most recent one:
This can be useful any time you want to back up your findings with real examples.
5. ChatGPT Search
ChatGPT search is OpenAI’s search experience built into ChatGPT, and it blends the AI chatbot’s functionality with real-time web results to help you find information quickly and easily.
ChatGPT will sometimes pull from the web automatically when it makes sense for the query. You can also choose to use the search function right away by clicking the “Tools” drop-down and selecting “Search the web.”
Instead of showing traditional search results, ChatGPT search gives you AI-generated summaries with clickable sources to explore further. These sources are pulled in real time from across the web.
Why I Think It’s a Great Google Alternative
ChatGPT search often surfaces sources that don’t appear in Google’s top results—and that can be helpful.
ChatGPT gave me a genuinely useful answer when I searched “is there a difference between lean marketing and agile marketing?”
It included a side-by-side table and a clear summary. And even explained how both approaches can work together.
It cited multiple sources, including some Reddit threads I didn’t see on Google.
With ChatGPT, I didn’t need to rephrase my search or click through multiple tabs. The summary was detailed, and the sources were clearly listed to allow for fast fact-checking
6. Yandex
Yandex is one of the best alternate search engines for users who speak Cyrillic-based languages because it understands local context that Google and Bing can miss.
It holds 2.45% of the global search engine market share.
Similar to Google, Yandex is an entire digital ecosystem.
You get Yandex Mail, Yandex Maps & Navigator, Yandex Translate, Yandex Taxi (a ride-hailing service), Yandex Market, Yandex Music, Yandex Eats, Yandex Disk (cloud storage), and even Alice—a Russian-language AI voice assistant.
You can use a single Yandex account to move between these services smoothly.
On the search side, Yandex gives you great filtering options that let you:
- Filter results by location to see content from a specific area
- Select a language, which is useful if you want Russian-only or English-only results
- Adjust date ranges to fetch results from different time periods
Why I Think It’s a Great Google Alternative
I love Yandex’s “Document language” filtering feature. You can set your preferred language right from the search results page.
You can do this in Google as well, but it takes a bit more work.
This is especially helpful for language learners.
So, if you want to read search results in other languages to practice, Yandex makes that super easy.
7. Brave Search
Brave Search is a privacy-first search engine that uses its own crawler and index, which makes it one of the few true Google alternatives.
It’s part of the Brave ecosystem, which includes a cookieless browser, a built-in VPN, a crypto wallet, and an AI assistant called Leo.
While Brave Search is free to use, it does show some search ads by default. If you prefer a completely ad-free experience, you can upgrade to the premium plan to remove them entirely.
Why I Think It’s a Great Google Alternative
One feature that really stands out to me is Goggles.
Goggles let you change how search results are ranked. I’ve used them to filter out big news outlets or to only see results from sources like Reddit and personal blogs.
When I’m looking for opinions or first-hand experience, I apply the Reddit Goggle. It cuts through all the affiliate-heavy listicles to show me real conversations.
You can use pre-built Goggles or even create your own if you want more control.
8. Startpage
Startpage is a search engine alternative to Google that gives you the same results as Google—without collecting your IP address, search history, or location.
You get a “Visit in Anonymous View” link under each result, so you can visit sites without revealing who you are. This prevents those websites from tracking you.
Startpage supports over 80 languages, making it a good option for global users who want Google-level relevance with none of the tracking.
Why I Think It’s a Great Google Alternative
The “Visit in Anonymous View” feature is what sets Startpage apart for me.
When I research tools, I don’t want to tip off every site I visit. Because I don’t always want to be served retargeting ads.
With Startpage, using this feature lets you visit sites while masking your information. There’s a blue bar at the top that clearly shows your session is being anonymized.
It feels like regular browsing but with a built-in privacy shield.
9. Perplexity
Perplexity is an AI-powered answer engine that uses real-time web information to give you concise responses with clickable sources included.
Like this:
You’ll find a “Discover” tab filled with timely stories across categories like tech, science, finance, sports, and culture.
Then there’s the “Spaces” tab you can use to upload files, give Perplexity instructions, and build collaborative research hubs to work with your team and keep all your research in one place.
Perplexity has a free option, but the Pro plan gives you more comprehensive answers, access to more advanced models (like GPT-4.1 and Claude 3.7 Sonnet), etc.
Why I Think It’s a Great Google Alternative
Perplexity is really helpful for finding specific statistics.
I wanted a stat on how many Gen Zers use TikTok for product discovery.
I tried Googling it first, but all I found were blog posts mentioning the same numbers from years ago.
So I entered this prompt into Perplexity:
“What percentage of Gen Z uses TikTok for product discovery in 2025? Source it from a research study or survey.”
It pulled stats directly from recent research.
That can save a lot of time that would otherwise be spent scouring the web and manually extracting relevant stats.
10. AOL
AOL works mainly as a news and media platform with a search engine (powered by Bing) built in.
The homepage is what makes AOL stand out. It’s packed with news headlines, lifestyle stories, horoscopes, finance updates, and email access.
If you like browsing curated content while you search, it’ll fit into your routine.
Just note that there are more ads than some might prefer.
Why I Think It’s a Great Google Alternative
What I like about AOL is that when I’m reading the news and something catches my attention, I can search for it right away without having to launch a separate tab (similar to Yahoo).
I was recently reading a news story on AOL’s homepage. I ran a search about a health term the article mentioned right in the built-in search function.
It felt less like switching tasks and more like continuing the same thought.
11. Baidu
Baidu is China’s leading search engine. Its algorithm is built for Mandarin, so it understands its main users’ grammar, tone, and slang far better than Google.
And Google Search is banned in China, so Baidu more or less owns the market.
You can start with a regular search.
Then switch to an AI-powered view that uses DeepSeek’s models to summarize results with a single click.
Search results also include Baidu Baike, China’s version of Wikipedia.
Another strength is Baidu Tieba, a Reddit-style forum that shows what users are actually saying. It’s useful for product research and uncovering trends.
Be aware that Baidu search results can be censored. And unless you have a Chinese phone number, some features won’t work.
Why I Think It’s a Great Google Alternative
I like that Baidu Tieba often appears right in the search results.
Google features threads from Reddit or Quora. Which means those conversations are sometimes more reflective of Western culture.
But if you want to understand what Chinese users actually think and care about, Baidu gives you a more direct window into that.
12. Naver
Naver is the leading search engine in South Korea thanks to its tight connection with Korean platforms.
It powers a full suite of tools: Naver Cafe (online community platform), Naver Blog (personal publishing), Naver Pay (digital wallet), and Naver Papago (a translation tool)
Naver feels more like a content portal than a traditional search engine.
The homepage features news, trending topics, weather, shopping deals, live sports scores, and quick links to all its services. It’s where many South Koreans start and end their days.
Search results are broken into themed verticals—blogs, cafes (community posts), Knowledge iN (Q&A), shopping listings, academic results, and more.
You don’t get a single ranked list like Google. You get a curated layout tailored to content type.
Why I Think It’s a Great Google Alternative
Naver provides a layered experience rather than a ranked list.
When I searched “college skincare routines,” the first result was a medical article explaining how routines should change based on skin type, weather, and age.
Next came YouTube videos from influencers showing their night routines.
Then, I saw product listings.
It felt less like a search engine and more like a curated assistant built around how people actually research and make decisions.
Optimize Your Website for All Search Engines
Each of the search engines other than Google mentioned in this list has its own strengths.
And with so many options out there, chances are your customers aren’t all using Google.
Do you know which search engines they prefer? Or where they’re located?
You can use the Semrush Traffic & Market Toolkit to find out.
It shows you where your audience is based, traffic trends by device, what sites (including search engines) they visit, and demographic details.
Try it today.