TL;DR - which privacy-focused search engine do people recommend, preferably one that can also easily be used as a default option in Safari?
I ditched Google in about 2016ish I would guess, and since then have used DDG as my default search engine.
As someone entrenched in the Apple ecosystem, it’s always seemed like a sound choice, as it’s one of the search engines built in to Safari on both iOS and macOS.
After spending a bit more time recently playing around with and updating my Docker containers, I started hosting a Whoogle container, which seemed to work pretty well, but I don’t see many out there talking about it, so not sure how good it actually is. I then tried a SearXNG container, but either had it misconfigured or just wasn’t getting many search results back.
At the moment I’m trying out Startpage, but I know there are potential privacy concerns since they were part-bought in 2019 by a US ad-tech company.
I’m also playing around with different browsers at the moment, flicking between Safari, Firefox and Brave. At which point I stumbled across Brave Search, which seems pretty promising.
So, which search engines do you all recommend?
UPDATE: Probably should’ve done a poll! But latest (if I’ve captured everything correctly) is:
- DuckDuckGo - 10
- Qwant / SearXNG / Kagi / Brave - 4
- Startpage / Ecosia - 2
- Google - 1
As to my other questions around browsers:
- Majority seem to use Firefox
- Some mentions of Brave
- One mention of Arc
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I like the fact that brave search has an AI, that’s why I use it. I might self-host a foss search engine though
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Do you use it on mobile? Have you had any success configuring it as default search on mobile because I gave up (iPhone)
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Would love to know this, and this did form part of my OP in terms of which search engines could be “hacked” into Safari.
Duckduckgo was brutal on my battery I switched back to Firefox
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Ready to get downvoted again
such courage
And bravery
I’ve always just used Safari as my browser on iOS and macOS so have never paid attention to reviews/opinions on the newer browsers such as Brave. Before I switched to Mac I always used Firefox on my Windows machines so know how privacy focused they’ve always been. But I’m hearing a lot of positives about Brave, and so far it seems pretty decent.
I’ve tried Arc but wasn’t entirely convinced. And in work I have a Windows machine so have been tied to Edge (although I’ve recently put in a request for Firefox and had it approved).
I guess it’d be nice to have a consistent search experience across the board, which the likes of DDG would give me. But definitely seeing good things about Brave and Brave Search.
I think the biggest selling point for Brave Search is that they are building their own index, and don’t rely on Bing or Google to do the search.
Every search engine is available on every browser. This means you can use brave search with browser not dependent on google’s code. It would also protect you from google’s web environment integrity plans
I think you replied to the wrong comment
I use presearch. Pretty happy with it. Never paid out my rewards, they’re just growing
DuckDuckGo from the browser, because 90% of the time I can get where I want with the appropriate ! bang from the address bar.
With the appropriate ! bang from the address bar
What does this mean? I want to like DuckDuckGo, but it’s kinda messy.
They are basically shortcuts. For example, I can type “!w ibuprofen” into DuckDuckGo (or the address bar because I have it set as my default search engine) and be brought immediately to the wikipedia page for Ibuprofen. There’s also !yt for youtube search, !so for stack overflow search, and many more.
Does anyone have experience/thoughts about Mojeek?
I just recently learned about it and haven’t really explored it, but curious.
Thanks!
I’ve played with it a bit. It’s just okay to me. I’d rather just use DDG.
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I recently started using Duck Duck Go instead of Google.
I still had this thought that Google was the best technology as I went from the early web (remember… altavista.digital.com, yahoo, …) and I remember that Google was really a game changer when it started to become popular.
I tested setting DDG as default search engine in my desktop and mobile browsers, thinking that when I don’t have expected results I would go to Google… I never had to switch to Google because I was wrong, DDG is as good as Google while being better from privacy point of view.
For the browser I use Vivaldi on both android and desktop.
I tried ecosia and startpage, the results through both are just 95% garbage. Duck Duck Go seems to be okay.
I use Vivaldi as my browser, includes ad block and various useful, if bulky, features.
Mullvad Leta
Been using Qwant for a few years. Good enough for 90% of searches imo. For whatever’s left, I’ll use DDG, Google in incognito, or Bing.
privacy focused … called qwant
Hmm.
Just using duckduckgo. I’m not happy with my search results as they heavily prioritize clickbait CEO blogs instead of showing official documentation / sources.
Duckduckgo results are pretty bad in my experience, brave search and startpage are way better.
I use Firefox as main browser, but I discovered for my use case google provides the best results without needing to setup every workstation e.g. 2 home PCs, 1 mobile, 2 for work. And that I need to use all main 3 browsers. Also google provide good service with functions to quickly make currency conversions, simple math ekvations etc which even Bing is far behind.
“AI” services will change this but for now it’s too slow.
But in general for me, I have given up that fact to try stay private many years back, it’s all a dream just like living off grid, 99% of would not survive 4 days.
But the information can be scrambled, ie shift user accounts, services, software etc. It would also provide better competition due to the userbase is moving around… But most of us are too lazy or afraid to lose history, backups, photos etc. Just see how many that can’t just delete an old reddit account due to the time spent to reach an level you aren’t ready to leave. To lead to famous qoute I follow online
“Don’t let yourself get attached to anything you are not willing to walk out on in 30 seconds flat if you feel the heat around the corner”
Its all about supporting the services you like and are trying to be an counterweight to the other common commercial services… Meaning we need to found/pay for good services, privacy is a luxary looking on the whole user base.
Companies, I based on an idea, but exist to make someone money and if it’s tracks it will make many people money and in the end majority will lead the company to earn money and leave the base idea behind.
I’m using an Ad-, Tracking- etc blocker in all my devices, so I’m not too worried about using Google or Bing when I do.
But I’m hosting my own instance of SearchXNG and that’s often simply the most powerful and flexible search engine.
Also self-host SearchXNG. Its definitely the way to go. I like you can choose which search engines to pull from
I replied to another comment on here saying that I’d tried this once before, via a Docker container, but just wasn’t getting any results back (kept getting timeouts from all the search engines).
I’ve just revisited it, and still get the timeouts. Reckon you’re able to help me troubleshoot it?
Below are the logs from Portainer:
File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/network/__init__.py", line 165, in get return request('get', url, **kwargs) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/network/__init__.py", line 98, in request raise httpx.TimeoutException('Timeout', request=None) from e httpx.TimeoutException: Timeout 2023-08-06 09:58:13,651 ERROR:searx.engines.soundcloud: Fail to initialize Traceback (most recent call last): File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/network/__init__.py", line 96, in request return future.result(timeout) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/usr/lib/python3.11/concurrent/futures/_base.py", line 458, in result raise TimeoutError() TimeoutError The above exception was the direct cause of the following exception: Traceback (most recent call last): File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/search/processors/abstract.py", line 75, in initialize self.engine.init(get_engine_from_settings(self.engine_name)) File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/engines/soundcloud.py", line 69, in init guest_client_id = get_client_id() ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/engines/soundcloud.py", line 45, in get_client_id response = http_get("https://soundcloud.com") ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/network/__init__.py", line 165, in get return request('get', url, **kwargs) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/network/__init__.py", line 98, in request raise httpx.TimeoutException('Timeout', request=None) from e httpx.TimeoutException: Timeout 2023-08-06 09:58:13,654 ERROR:searx.engines.soundcloud: Fail to initialize Traceback (most recent call last): File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/network/__init__.py", line 96, in request return future.result(timeout) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/usr/lib/python3.11/concurrent/futures/_base.py", line 458, in result raise TimeoutError() TimeoutError The above exception was the direct cause of the following exception: Traceback (most recent call last): File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/search/processors/abstract.py", line 75, in initialize self.engine.init(get_engine_from_settings(self.engine_name)) File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/engines/soundcloud.py", line 69, in init guest_client_id = get_client_id() ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/engines/soundcloud.py", line 45, in get_client_id response = http_get("https://soundcloud.com") ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/network/__init__.py", line 165, in get return request('get', url, **kwargs) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ File "/usr/local/searxng/searx/network/__init__.py", line 98, in request raise httpx.TimeoutException('Timeout', request=None) from e httpx.TimeoutException: Timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,024 ERROR:searx.engines.wikidata: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,024 ERROR:searx.engines.duckduckgo: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,024 ERROR:searx.engines.google: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,024 ERROR:searx.engines.qwant: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,024 ERROR:searx.engines.startpage: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,024 ERROR:searx.engines.wikibooks: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,024 ERROR:searx.engines.wikiquote: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,024 ERROR:searx.engines.wikisource: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,025 ERROR:searx.engines.wikipecies: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,025 ERROR:searx.engines.wikiversity: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,025 ERROR:searx.engines.wikivoyage: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,025 ERROR:searx.engines.brave: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:02:05,481 WARNING:searx.engines.wikidata: ErrorContext('searx/search/processors/online.py', 118, "response = req(params['url'], **request_args)", 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:02:05,481 ERROR:searx.engines.wikidata: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 6.457878380082548 s, timeout: 6.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:02:05,482 WARNING:searx.engines.wikisource: ErrorContext('searx/search/processors/online.py', 118, "response = req(params['url'], **request_args)", 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:02:05,484 ERROR:searx.engines.wikisource: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 6.460748491808772 s, timeout: 6.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:02:05,485 WARNING:searx.engines.brave: ErrorContext('searx/search/processors/online.py', 118, "response = req(params['url'], **request_args)", 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:02:05,485 ERROR:searx.engines.brave: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 6.461546086706221 s, timeout: 6.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:02:05,487 WARNING:searx.engines.google: ErrorContext('searx/search/processors/online.py', 118, "response = req(params['url'], **request_args)", 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:02:05,487 ERROR:searx.engines.google: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 6.463769535068423 s, timeout: 6.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:02:05,489 WARNING:searx.engines.wikiversity: ErrorContext('searx/search/processors/online.py', 118, "response = req(params['url'], **request_args)", 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:02:05,489 ERROR:searx.engines.wikiversity: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 6.466003180015832 s, timeout: 6.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:02:05,490 WARNING:searx.engines.wikivoyage: ErrorContext('searx/search/processors/online.py', 118, "response = req(params['url'], **request_args)", 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:02:05,490 ERROR:searx.engines.wikivoyage: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 6.466597221791744 s, timeout: 6.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:02:05,490 WARNING:searx.engines.qwant: ErrorContext('searx/search/processors/online.py', 118, "response = req(params['url'], **request_args)", 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:02:05,490 ERROR:searx.engines.qwant: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 6.4669976509176195 s, timeout: 6.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:02:05,491 WARNING:searx.engines.wikibooks: ErrorContext('searx/search/processors/online.py', 118, "response = req(params['url'], **request_args)", 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:02:05,491 ERROR:searx.engines.wikibooks: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 6.4674198678694665 s, timeout: 6.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:02:05,491 WARNING:searx.engines.wikiquote: ErrorContext('searx/search/processors/online.py', 118, "response = req(params['url'], **request_args)", 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:02:05,492 WARNING:searx.engines.wikipecies: ErrorContext('searx/search/processors/online.py', 118, "response = req(params['url'], **request_args)", 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:02:05,492 ERROR:searx.engines.wikiquote: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 6.468321242835373 s, timeout: 6.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:02:05,492 ERROR:searx.engines.wikipecies: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 6.468797960784286 s, timeout: 6.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:02:05,496 WARNING:searx.engines.duckduckgo: ErrorContext('searx/engines/duckduckgo.py', 98, 'res = get(query_url, headers=headers)', 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:02:05,497 ERROR:searx.engines.duckduckgo: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 6.47349306801334 s, timeout: 6.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:02:05,511 WARNING:searx.engines.startpage: ErrorContext('searx/engines/startpage.py', 214, 'resp = get(get_sc_url, headers=headers)', 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:02:05,511 ERROR:searx.engines.startpage: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 6.487425099126995 s, timeout: 6.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:04:27,475 ERROR:searx.engines.duckduckgo: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:04:27,770 WARNING:searx.engines.duckduckgo: ErrorContext('searx/search/processors/online.py', 118, "response = req(params['url'], **request_args)", 'httpx.TimeoutException', None, (None, None, None)) False 2023-08-06 10:04:27,771 ERROR:searx.engines.duckduckgo: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 3.2968566291965544 s, timeout: 3.0 s) : TimeoutException 2023-08-06 10:04:50,094 ERROR:searx.engines.duckduckgo: engine timeout 2023-08-06 10:04:50,187 WARNING:searx.engines.duckduckgo: ErrorContext('searx/engines/duckduckgo.py', 98, 'res = get(query_url, headers=headers)', 'httpx.ConnectTimeout', None, (None, None, 'duckduckgo.com')) False 2023-08-06 10:04:50,187 ERROR:searx.engines.duckduckgo: HTTP requests timeout (search duration : 3.0933595369569957 s, timeout: 3.0 s) : ConnectTimeoutThe above is a simple search for “best privacy focused search engines 2023”, followed by the same search again but using the ddg! bang in front of it.
I can post my docker-compose if it helps?
First thing that comes to mind is are you running it on Host Network? That’s a requirement
Thanks, I’ll take a look. I didn’t know about that post.
