When we talk about search engines, what comes to mind? There can only be one thing that pops straight in there, Google. Such is the monopoly that Google has created in search engines, that the phrase searching for information on the Internet has been replaced by simply "Googling" stuff.
This is essentially the job a search engine does, but Google evolved from one and grew into a brand now recognized as arguably the biggest in the world. This has led to fewer developments in their search engine UI, and other promising search engines have had the leeway to catch up. Here are some of the most prominent competitors to Google and what they offer.
YAHOO SEARCH
Yahoo Search is a neat search engine, which does not have the algorithm complexity of Google, as it is a human
directory search engine, as opposed to Google which is a web crawler search engine. The difference is that human
directory search engines filter information manually, whereas web crawlers filter information through spiders
that survey the indexed information.
BING
Bing was Microsoft's attempt to rival Google. They have an excellent User Interface and have a prominent USP
(Unique Selling Proposition)- Images. Their image gallery and indexing is second to none, and the search engine
result pages give high attention to image quality and uniqueness. However, the speed and efficiency is lacking
in comparison to Google, and hence it is not as popular. It is, however, the most popular search engine on this
list, accounting for 12% of all searches apart from Google worldwide.
DUCKDUCKGO
DuckDuckGo is a pro-privacy search engine that does not track your personal information for ad space. They know
it, and make sure you do as well! They also do not show bias to search engine results, and are purely organic in
their result display. There is no premeditation of what you might be "likely" to click on while displaying a
search result. It also filters out content bits from content farms, curated specifically to be ranked high on
SERPs and bearing little to no utility to users.
YANDEX
This is a Russian search engine, similar in mould to Google in that it also functions through spiders who crawl
and index information. Yandex is renowned for its aversion to links in order to avoid link spam, and its SERPs
are predominantly keyword oriented.
STARTPAGE
Startpage is a proxy search engine that allows you to anonymously visit websites. This means that you cannot be
tracked by third parties lurking on websites. It is a hybrid search engine, which pulls the best results from
two or more search engines of varying types. However, Google is one of the sources for its results, which makes
it heavily reliant on Google's performance.
The coolest thing about free website SEO audits is that they cater to not only Google's SERPs, but also other search engines. Any SEO checker online can recognize a search engine that uses Web crawlers, or human directories. Take your pick of the style you prefer to use!