Apple Considered Switch to Search Engine DuckDuckGo from Google | Hacker News Reader

Apple Considered Switch to Search Engine DuckDuckGo from Google

bloomberg.com

39 pointsjedwhite26 comments

I love DuckDuckGo but Apple needs to invest a lot into it if they want it to be anywhere on par with Google. I use DDG primarily as much search engine on all my devices but the lack of customization in the search input and the fact that the results are objectively worse than Google's for the same terms means I find myself using Google often enough to where I think this is a bad idea for most users. I say this as someone who really hates Google's data and privacy stances and who has to reluctantly admit that their tool is simply better for the job.

all you wrote I did too, but i tried Kagi a few months back and it works really well. i pay to subscribe to kagi, and it's been worth it, and affordable.

I use DDG as my main search engine for several years now. It used to be that google results were better, but for more than a year now I've found the google results to be worse. I hardly ever do !g these ays. Recently I did a comparison between google, DDG and Kagi and to my surprise for the handful of terms the results were very similar, where DDG with ads turned off usually gave the best results. That included searches for stuff like Kreditkarte which I guess is a lucrative search term. I live in Germany, that does affect things.

> fact that the results are objectively worse than Google's for the same terms

By what metric? For around a year now I use primarily DDG and I often find much better results, for both work/programming-related stuff as well as day to day stuff(assuming I enabled search in context of a country). They also added a lot of utilities I often used in google like currency converters, calculator, date stuff, I don't know what's the last time I had to switch to google for anything really.

By the number of times you have to switch back to google and find it more relevant :)

(but don't know about objective metrics)

DDG is perfect for most stuff, I search for. It's only when I search for technical problems like error messages, that I sometimes add !g.

But recently DDG has gotten better with this kind of searches. I don't really need Google anymore.

I think google search results are pretty bad these days. A lot of times the top results are pages that are ad-ridden and don’t contain the actual info I was looking for.

Granted, my metric of “good” is an unquantified and very subjective but to me both Bing and DuckDuckGo outperform google search.

I've used DDG for years, and while initially Google gave much better results, for the past year or so, i've found that DDG usually finds what i want within the first page of results, where Google will have it on page 2-3-4, if at all.

It may just be that i've "gotten used" to using DDG, but i generally think it's better than Google at this point in time.

The only winning point (in my books) for Google goes to Shopping.

Kagi has been nice, but their basic subscription plan doesn’t allow nearly enough searches. I might cancel until they raise the limit. The upgraded plan is unlimited searches though and I find them superior to google

I just signed up for their $10 a month plan it includes unlimited searches. I’ve only been on it about two days but so far so good. I’m pretty happy.

That's the first mod I make to a new OS. But people take defaults. DuckDuckGo is indistinguishable from Bing the times I have compared, but I obviously prefer the privacy policy.

Indistinguishable from Bing because aside from the 'instant answers' they provide, DuckDuckGo leans very heavily on Bing, per their FAQ: [1]

> Of course, we have more traditional links and images in our search results too, which we largely source from Bing.

[1]: https://duckduckgo.github.io/duckduckgo-help-pages/results/s...

https://archive.ph/dFd7A

I'm using DDG as the primary browser on iOS.

Using Google as the primary search engine with Private Relay and content blockers turned on is a terrible experience. I had to identify so many traffic lights and buses.

Part of me thinks the world would be better if Apple bought Kagi and pumped enough money and talent into them to make them the next Google Search

As a recent Kagi user, no thanks, cause it would be Apple only then.

Apple can't just copy DDG in a year?

And they probably talked to Bing and Altavista. Smart thinking to cover yourself for an antitrust case when Google is a $10B/yr golden egg.

I just wish they’d let end-users set their own search engines natively vs the current walled garden.

Um... What? You can already set your own preferred Search Engine on both iOS and macOS.

Yeah I guess anything is possible but it takes effort

How much easier can it get than the current dropdown allowing you to choose a search engine?

The current dropdown actually allowing you to choose any search engine (and add search options to any of them as well)

It’s a single click on the search icon in the omnibar. Can’t get easier than that.

You can set a search engine from a short predefined list. If your preferred engine is Kagi or Brave Search or a myriad of others, you have to resort to trickery or extensions.

They do and they provide a lot of options too.

Right now there's Google, Yahoo, Bing, DDG and Ecosia.

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