Pros: Ads are exclusively opt-IN, not opt-OUT, so they’re blocked by default. If you want, you can opt in to ads AND make money off your ad views with their ad revenue-share program. Faster bc ads are blocked and more private bc you’re not being stalked around the internet. If you switch to the browser as well, the switch from Chrome is painless bc it operates on the same code base but doesn’t share information or algorithms with Google. Apparently, they’ve also got video calling now, like Google Meet. You can sync across devices, although it’s got some steps in the process.

Cons: If you’re wanting to go entirely anti-AI, Brave does still leverage AI overviews, although I believe they CAN be turned off. There are also not as many extension compatibilities, though that is rapidly changing - while I don’t use a lot of extensions, my password manager extension really wouldn’t work for the first month, but that has since been fixed. The cross-device syncing is great, but you do have to actually permit it to happen, though the steps are pretty painless. I will say that I hate that the mobile browser does not support tab groups. Some on Reddit don’t like the verification/CAPTCHA screens that come up sometimes, and others don’t love the local search results. I also do still end up using Google for some things that I just don’t enjoy the Brave interface for, like Maps or travel accommodations. Finally, I personally HATE that I can’t filter the News-specific tab by date - you can in the general search results, but not in News, and that’s largely where I use that filter when doing research.

Pros: Doesn’t store any of your search history or personal info and only collects data where legally required. Doesn’t track your online behavior and deletes any information about you as soon as it’s not required. No geotracking. End-to-end encryption, strong focus on data privacy, no targeted advertising.

Cons: Obviously, with no ad targeting, it means the ads you DO get are less personalized to you, which might feel like a “why TF am I seeing this?” moment a lot - the ads are “contextual,” so you’re getting ads for humidifiers right now bc you did a search for humidifiers right now, not bc you did one three weeks ago on a different site. There are some concerns about a search function called !bang - primarily that, when you use it, you basically forfeit the foundational DDG protections. Also, there ARE AI overviews, though they can be disabled entirely. There is also some question about data sharing with Microsoft - some suggest it’s still happening to an extent, while others say that DDG abandoned the partnership bc of user sentiment.

Pros: Every time you run a search, a tree gets planted (200M so far)! Feel good about your own personal reforestation while corporations destroy the rest. They’re a transparent company, publishing monthly financial and ecological reports, with a net-positive carbon impact (so like…better than carbon-neutral). Calm, minimalist interface. 80% of their profits go to tree-planting initiatives.

Cons: Results are powered by Bing, so if you’re looking to totally anti-corporate everything, that’s an issue. Really, overall, despite a stated commitment to privacy, it sounds like there is some info-sharing going on…and using Microsoft search results and ads seems to suggest that. HOWEVER it does seem like they are trying to build their own search index, so it’s possible that will all change.

Pros: You can “zap” your browsing history in one click, with the Zap button, just erasing the whole damn thing. You’re likely to get fewer results designed to confirm your own biases, since, like the other privacy-centric engines, Qwant does not track your personal history, so it’s delivering results based on quality of information and not matchmaking with your deeply held beliefs. It also has an extension so you can make it your primary search engine without making it your browser default. If you’re in Europe, even better: It is known for having better local results in Europe overall. It also appears to be partnering with Ecosia so that they can work on their own shared search index together to eliminate reliance on Microsoft.

Cons: Despite 70% independence, Qwant DOES still pull from Microsoft’s search index for the other 30%. It also did bring in AI overviews in 2025, so it’s not an entirely AI-independent solution and I can’t find anywhere that says you can turn it off. If you’re NOT in Europe, you may find the local results less helpful.

Pros: Time and again, I keep reading about just how much BETTER the quality of search results is on Kagi. There are no ads, ever, and the only data they keep on you is your email address and payment information for the account you need to create with them. There is also a free tier, so you can try it and decide if you like it before you buy it. You can build a personal block list with up to 1,000 domains you want to block entirely, so if you’d rather never see, idk, Newsmax results, great news: you ain’t gotta. If you don’t wanna block domains entirely, you can also manually deprioritize them so they don’t show up so high in your results. The feature that maybe has me the most intrigued is Lenses, where you can choose to see results specifically from niche groups or small blogs or creators, which would be SUPER helpful for me when I’m trying to plan travel and am not interested in the recommendations for all the same tourist shit everyone does. They’ve also added more browsers for their extension—they don’t actually have a Kagi browser, it’s JUST the search engine—so it’s easy to use with alternative browsers to Chrome.

Cons: I was bummed to find that there are some pretty sizable cons when it comes to Kagi, and you gotta decide if you’re good with them or not. First, they’re very AI-forward as an ethos, though every time they’ve tried to introduce less “'optional” AI usage, they’ve been met with strong resistance from a paid user base, so they’ve retreated…which is, of course, the advantage of being a paid user base in the first place (from the user perspective.) You will get AI overviews if you type a “?” at the end of your search. They also do use Yandex, Russia’s big-ass search engine, so a small portion of their money does go to Russia. For some people, that’s a dealbreaker. For others, it’s like…not that different from giving money to Google in the US. Yes, it IS something you have to pay for, though Kagi estimates that Google makes almost $300/year off of each user, so there’s a question of whether your data is worth half of that out of your own pocket for you to keep it private and not out there everywhere.