I have used SearXNG for a while, but I switched to LibreX after the search engine started glitching. Recently, though, LibreX has stopped returning any results. I am currently on Mojeek, but the results aren’t that great.
I have also tried Qwant, but I wasn’t too keen on it. Startpage will be impractical, as I use a VPN and this engine often blocks me because of it. I don’t want to use Brave Search for a number of reasons. MetaGer has too many important features behind its paywall. I’m not sure about DuckDuckGo, but I could use it if there was no other option.
Any suggestions, or am I being too picky?
I primarily use DuckDuckGo, and occasionally have to use a !bang to get to the Startpage or Google.
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Been a happy Kagi user for 6+ months now. No more Pinterest and other blogspam in my searches
Aren’t they fundamentally anti privacy? You have to be logged in so they can correlate literally everything you search for or click on with a credit card number and real name…
They ask a bit of trust on that, but their FAQ also has an appeal to reason:
I have privacy concerns over linking my search queries with my credit card. Why should I trust you?
We do not log search queries. Queries you type are never associated with your account. The simple reason is we don’t have any reason to do so, as it would only be a liability for us. We are in the business of selling search results, not user data.
(For the record, I use Kagi)
That’s asking for a hell of a lot of trust in them… wouldn’t be the first, or last, time companies lie about these things.
Yeah. I don’t think something that requires payment is inherently private. Even when paying for a service with something like Monero, you are still required to log into an account to use it.
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You could absolutely have a profile built about you on a VPN. VPNs don’t necessarilly have to be telling the truth when they say they don’t keep logs. You are entrusting the VPN with all of your internet traffic, which just passes the responsability from the ISP to the VPN provider.
I do use a VPN, but I am aware of its flaws.
Tor and/or I2P is what people should be using if they require absolute privacy (like if they’re a whistleblower).
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If SearXNG worked for you, why not use a more stable instance?
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What issues did you have with SearXNG?
You could try to self host it, or even just run it on your local machine.
Shameless plug on how to set it up locally, and how to set up custom filters
It stopped returning results. I tried other instances: same problems. However, I think the issue may have been fixed.
I am currently on an iPhone, and I’m not really in a position to self-host (although I did try to set up a FreedomBox the other day).
Ah fair enough.
I started by having it on my laptop, and used it only there. Liked it so much that I’m renting a VPS around $5 a month to have it on all my devices.
But to be fair, I’m also hosting other things on that VPS (SearXNG is very light), so it’s multi-purpose.
Who do you like for VPS hosting?
I recommend Oracle Cloud Always Free - 4 Arm cores, 24GB RAM, 200GB storage. I’ve used it before they sanctioned Russia and it worked fine (but if hardware fails your data will stay but you will be at the bottom of the queue for replacement)
Went with linode since it was reasonably priced and popular. But might move if something better comes along.
I have all the server setup done with ansible, so it’s super easy to reproduce everything in a new machine.
Hetzner.
I used it for a while but could not find good results for any kind of advanced query. Qwant in comparison is slightly better but still worse than duckduckgo unfortunately. For really niche stuff I still need to revert to Google…
You can get both qwant, duckduckgo, and Google with SearXNG, unless the instance you used had a config to not have them as an option…
That’s why I just prefer to use my own.
I use Startpage, it’s based within the EU and a proxy for Google results!
Vpn block…
What?
It was mentioned in OP’s post: Startpage tends to block those coming in from VPNs.
You’re right, I’ve totally read over it. Sorry :) Can’t imagine a VPN is blocking it as I use it all the time, with and without a VPN. Maybe it’s your VPN provider?
I also use StartPage (always with a VPN) and have <1% of my searches blocked. I’m sure there is some logic as to why the occasional search doesn’t get through, but I haven’t been able to work it out.
Why wpuld they do that? Unless they want to track you…
Because VPN IP addresses are commonly associated with malicious activity.
Google results
which these days are very very bad! especially if you search something tech/programming related.
Qwant and kagi have been a great pair. Brave search was good, but they had some controversy a bit back.
I don’t want to use Brave Search for a number of reasons.
Mind sharing? I’m curious because I switched to DDG several days ago, after a good while of using Brave. My reasons were:
- defaulting to Moderate safe search every couple of days
- inability to provide me with good results for simple ‘[word] wiktionary’ queries
- having to block some elements of their result templates manually, using their own browser’s filtering feature (featured snippets, definitions etc)
- poorer search results compared to what they were a year, two ago
Some people here mentioned Kagi and I liked it a lot when I was beta-testing it, but I will only start paying for using it when they introduce full support for Boolean operators, which most likely means never.
I don’t like Brave as a company. Brendan Eich is an arsehole, Brave Browser has had (minor, but numerous) controversies, their crypto stuff is off-putting, and now they’re sticking their new AI into everything.
I tried using SearXNG for a few weeks but I kept needing to chance instances. I’m using DuckDuckGo for now.
You can self host for a better experience
I have to say I used Random Searx a lot, startpage as Backup. And as VPNs are getting mainstream, it gets a pain in the ass. Mullvad Leta sucks too kinda. Now I use duckduckgo alone and actually never need my specially configured SearXNG search providers, although useful.
I have to say, I use a lot of search engines. Using the “Add custom search” Addon on Firefox you can easily add any URL containing a search word to your browser.
I maintain some lists of search engines that need updating.
I’m using https://metager.de/ it’s German and sometimes the results lean towards that but in 99% of cases it doesn’t matter.
There’s an English version out there, but some essential features are paid, such as enabling moderate safesearch or adding Mojeek as an engine.
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I’d say give SearXNG another try. Whats the issue exactly?
I used SearXNG for over a month but found myself routinely returning to Google for either tech problem searches or because it was returning irrelevant results for homonyms.
I would love to return to it. Do you have any tips for better search results?
- Depending on your language, use language codes like
:enor:de. Very important if your native language isn’t English. - You can choose the search engine using DDG shebangs like
!g(or redirect yourself to Google using!!g - If SearxNG using Google gives you much worse results, it just means Google has that much info about you. Nonetheless, that’s not my experience
- Depending on your language, use language codes like
tbh im not sure but if you want google results with safesearch try resulti
As main search, among others, I use Andisearch, it’s an AI search assistant, with own lenguage model and one of the most private search engine. own reader mode for websites in the search results, so you don’t need to visit it, you also can watch YouTube and others sandboxed right in the search results, anonymous use, no ads, no tracking, no logs.
Easy add it to your search engine list in your browser
https://andisearch.com/?query=%s
