Alternatives to Brave Search
A private web search engine built on its own independent index, with optional AI answers. The listings below can replace it for an important use case. Each note says what changes if you switch.
The original
Brave Search
A private web search engine built on its own independent index, with optional AI answers.
Replacements
Listings that take over the same core job as Brave Search.
DuckDuckGo Search
A web search engine that does not track or profile its users.
DuckDuckGo Search is a free no-profiling engine with Duck.ai chat, but it shows ads and does not highlight an independent index like Brave's.
Startpage
A web search engine that does not keep search histories and lets you view results anonymously.
Startpage keeps no search histories and adds anonymous viewing of result pages, though its privacy protections rest on the operator's stated policy.
Mojeek
An independent UK search engine with its own crawler and index that does not track users.
Mojeek also runs its own independent crawler and index, based in the UK, with an API, but its smaller index returns fewer results for some queries.
Qwant
A French web search engine hosted in Europe that says it does not keep search data.
Qwant is hosted in Europe under EU rules and offers iOS and Android apps, but it is closed source and results vary outside French and European content.
Kagi
A paid, ad-free web search engine with anti-tracking, result customization and an AI assistant.
Kagi is a paid, ad-free engine with per-site blocking, Lenses and an AI assistant, and it requires a subscription and an account unlike free Brave Search.
SearXNG
Self-hosted metasearch engine that aggregates results without profiling you.
SearXNG is an open-source, self-hosted metasearch engine aggregating dozens of engines, keeping queries under your control but requiring ongoing maintenance of your own instance.
Swisscows
A Swiss private search engine with no tracking and results filtered to be family-friendly.
Swisscows is a Swiss no-tracking engine with built-in filtering of violent and adult content and mobile apps, aimed at families and schools.
MetaGer
A privacy-focused metasearch engine and anonymous browsing service paid for with a prepaid key.
MetaGer is an open-source metasearch engine run by a non-profit, paid with a prepaid key and no account, with results depending on underlying engines.
Also worth comparing
These listings name Brave Search as their own alternative, so the relationship runs both ways.
4get
A proxying metasearch engine you can use through public instances or host yourself.
Brave Search uses its own independent index instead of querying other engines, and adds Goggles ranking and optional AI answers, but it is not self-hostable.
LibreY
A self-hostable privacy-respecting metasearch engine built without frameworks or JavaScript.
Brave Search uses its own independent index rather than querying upstream engines, adds optional AI answers, and cannot be self-hosted.
Perplexity
An AI answer engine that searches the web and replies with cited sources.
Brave Search is free, uses its own independent index without profiling users, and offers optional AI answers rather than a chat-first answer engine.
