I am kinda fed up off trying all these privacy focused search engines which provide lesser quality service. Here’s what I’ve tried so far:

  1. Duckduckgo: bad results when you search something that piracy related
  2. Searx: I’m not geeky enough to host mine own searx so I just jump from one instance to another and the uptimes have been bad.
  3. Startpage: Idk why it’s down most of the time
  4. Ecosia: Not very private, but I just tried it for the sake of it. It’s bad when it comes to the results.

Honestly I feel Brave search is the best when it comes to results. But the sketchy practices kept me away from it. Kagi is paid so I haven’t tried it.

What have you been using?

  • Tinkerer@lemmy.caEnglish
    16·
    5 months ago

    I’ve been uaing my own selfhosted searxng instance. Absolutely love it.

  • ekZepp@lemmy.worldEnglish
    162·
    5 months ago

    Duck Duck works for me. I use the “Disable Ai” addon (libreoffice) to remove most of the useless stuff. I’ve also tried Ecosia, but the lack of option for chronological results is a big No for me.

    • teyrnon@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      51·
      5 months ago

      You are doing business with google when using it though, and it’s results have severely enshitified along with the rest since 2021. (They pay google.)

        • teyrnon@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          61·
          5 months ago

          Which amounts to the same thing. I use startpage too for lack of an alternative, but it’s not ideal. I want to do zero business with these silicon valley parasites.

    • s38b35M5@lemmy.worlddeleted by creatorEnglish
      2·
      5 months ago

      Same. Been using for two years or more. Never had an issue except the settings cookie seems to expire monthly.

    • zerozaku@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
      32·
      5 months ago

      I get this page all the time idk why. I thought it was startpage’s issue.

  • okwhateverdude@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2411·
    5 months ago

    If you aren’t paying for it, you are the product. I pay for Kagi and I am very happy with the results and tools they develop.

    • sem@piefed.blahaj.zoneEnglish
      27·
      5 months ago

      Lots of times you pay, but you are still the product.

      I also use kagi when I need it, and have managed to stay on the free tier. DDG for everything else.

      • artyom@piefed.socialEnglish
        131·
        5 months ago

        And even sometimes you don’t pay and still aren’t the product. See most FOSS stuff. The statement is just false.

    • rozodru@piefed.worldEnglish
      8·
      5 months ago

      I have a hard time justifying paying for it. it’s a good search engine but I don’t agree with their AI stance.

    • cardfire@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      1·
      5 months ago

      I very much want to use KAGI but their basic tier isn’t enough querying for me in any given month. I have to rephrase, or correct my own typos at least 300 times a month, in my searches.

    • cardfire@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      2·
      5 months ago

      This is exciting to hear! Last I heard, Ecosia just wrapped Google’s results. KAGI is pretty upfront about doing the same.

      This will sound silly, but an absolute need-to-have for me is the ability to throw basic math problems into the search bar as a calculator.

      I never reach for a calculator or spin up a separate app for it, or want to widget on my desktop… instead, I just press the keyboard shortcut for a new tab in my browser and then just belt out whatever parentheticals I need.

      This pretty much serves as the basis for my evaluating different search engines, if it won’t handle the algebra for me, I have to move on.

      • passenger@sopuli.xyzEnglish
        2·
        5 months ago

        Afaik qwant is using Bing where their own index fails.

        You could set up a key combo for a calculator app all the same. And have some fancier calculator app open locally…

        • cardfire@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          2·
          5 months ago

          I absolutely could launch the calculator app by keyboard shortcut when I’m on a desktop. And I kept a calculator widget across an entire full screen in my Android phone’s home menu, for many years.

          These days, I really value the ability to just open a new tab, belt out my instructions, hit enter, and see the result though - - it is mostly things like calculating the total cost of buying something across a year, or calculating currency conversions, or estimating battery capacities and consumption rates.

          In this regard, without wanting to buy into an entire AI ecosystem, I do require my search engines to do at least one function beyond mere searches: Pre-algebra.

  • HelloRoot@lemy.lolEnglish
    8·
    5 months ago

    searXNG

    with a lot of “backends”. I like how it aggregates the results from multiple engines, at least for my searches they turn out consistently more relevant when using any single search.

  • Corvus Cornix@piefed.socialEnglish
    71·
    5 months ago

    I know you mentioned having tried it but my experience with DDG has been pretty good and it’s what I use (edit to add that I’m not doubting your experience with it has been poor and this isn’t intended to sound flippant).

    I see Kagi come up a lot. I don’t trust engines like Kagi not to link my payment data with my search history, personally. They’re a US company, so consider what that means in the current state of the world and privacy. I haven’t deeply investigated the validity of it, but the Kagi CEO allegedly harassed a journalist (minor edit, a blogger) who had a critical take on their service, and supposedly they were founded as - you guessed it - an AI company.

    And sure, DDG is a US company, too. But they don’t really have anything personally identifying to link my searches back to me. I can accept the ads (though I have uBlock), which are only contextually targeted based on search keywords. I don’t think I’d use their browser or extensions, which would have a much more privileged place in my “tech stack”, but for search it does well enough.

  • Wildmimic@anarchist.nexusEnglish
    4·
    5 months ago

    after a similar path that you took, I now use Metager.org, a privacy respecting meta search engine. You pay for your search requests, but it’s very, very cheap since it is run by a nonprofit (around a eurocent/search depending on settings). They integrate a lot of smaller search indexes, and you can choose to integrate braves and googles index if you wish. You can blacklist webpages too, and the source is FOSS.