Apple drops Google for Bing as iOS, OS X default Spotlight search engine

52 Comments

“Microsoft’s Bing search engine celebrated its fifth anniversary on Tuesday, a day after it made big gains against rival Google on Apple’s software platforms,” Patrick Seitz reports for Investor’s Business Daily.

“Microsoft launched Bing on June 3, 2009, with the mission of offering better Internet search results than search engine leader Google. To celebrate the 5-year milestone, Microsoft offered up a gallery of some of its most popular and notable Bing home pages,” Seitz reports. “On Monday, Apple executives showed how they have integrated Bing into the new Mac OS X release called Yosemite. Apple revealed that it has dropped Google in favor of Bing for its desktop search app called Spotlight, Search Engine Land reported.”

Last year Bing became the default web search for Siri, and will now also be the default web search provider in the redesigned Spotlight search feature for the next generation of iOS and OS X. We’re excited about extending the Bing platform to help iOS and Mac customers find what they need to get things done. – Stefan Weitz, Microsoft Bing director of search

“Google is still the default search engine on Apple’s Safari Web browser, but speech-recognition app Siri and Spotlight search are two workarounds that bypass Google,” Seitz reports. “In April, Google led search rankings with 67.6% market share, followed by Microsoft with 18.7% and Yahoo with 10%, ComScore said in a press release. Microsoft’s gains in the past five years have come almost entirely at the expense of supposed partner Yahoo.”

Read more in the full article here.

MacDailyNews Take: As we wrote on August 8, 2011:

Google will rue the day they decided to get greedy by working against Apple instead of with them.

52 Comments

    2. For those living in a cave, DDG = Duck Duck Go which is a search engine that doesn’t track your results, doesn’t show you ads, and doesn’t skew your search results based on which companies paid the search engine the most money.

      Reply

      1. Thank you for the explanation. I do not live in a cave and I have heard of Duck Duck Go but had no clue what applepostle meant by DDG. I guess I have some unconnected neurons.

        Reply

    1. …As you post this on YouTube.

      I definitely prefer Google to Bing search and use YouTube every day. I just can’t stand Android and that mess of crap phones and tablets. It looks like Google will eventually lose because of it’s Android decision. They had everything as an iOS partner and, instead of improving products and services, chose to compete with their close partner.

      Reply

      1. The ironic thing is that Google has worked on Android as protection for mobile advertising for itself, yet Google’s own results and testimony in court cases show that Google gets very little ad revenue from Android. In fact, Google gets more ad revenue from iOS devices than Android devices, which supposedly are more popular or at least in more devices.

        Google is wasting its resources developing Android. It would have been far less work and much more beneficial for Google to partner with Apple, blackberry, etc. on their mobile devices.

        Reply

      2. If there was an Android vacuum Windows Phone would most likely take over, that would mean microsoft services going to most smartphones. It was smart of Google to create Android and secure their future. As with apple going Bing, Iam willing to bet most people will opt to use Google as their search engine

        Reply

  3. Steve had come to loathe Google, which he felt was copying features of the iPhone while withholding a key feature of Google Maps that allows smartphones to dictate turn-by-turn directions aloud. Jobs also discussed pulling Google search from the iPhone, but figured that customers would reject that move, according to two former Apple executives.

    Reply

    3. It is not about Evil percentage – It is simply that they have no moral compass and $ is the only thing they care about similar to the idiot on Shark Tank saying it is always about $ (I am glad I am not in his household).

      Reply

      1. Well… to exist a business must make money. That is, after all, the primary reason why people form businesses. My problem with Google is that they’re so obsessed with data mining that they often cross the barriers of privacy. Microsoft likely isn’t any different. As they see their importance shrinking, they will want to engage in the same data mining that Google does. From my experience, Bing has sucked. It may well be great for other people, but it hasn’t been great for me. Google still maintains the best search engine in my opinion.

        Reply

        1. Some businesses exist only to make money. They will do anything they think they can get away with as long as it fattens their wallets. (Put list of companies here….. MS, Goog….)

          Others exist to please their customers. They figure if they do that right, the money will follow. They want to be socially responsible and helpful to the community. That may/may not decrease their total money, but they see it as a responsibility, knowing they are going to do OK anyway.

  5. I’m not exactly all that excited about this. I’m very Anti-M$ as it is, so to me, the most logical thing to do is switch over to Yahoo. I really love their services, and was pleasantly surprised when they created Yahoo Widgets. (You will be missed 🙁 . Besides, Marissa Meyer looks better than anyone at either company! An Apple/Yahoo joint partnership is like a dream team to me. 🙂

    Reply

  6. Bing is my second choice for a web search engine. I’m very happy that my first choice, “DuckDuckGo” will be one of the default options in Safari in Yosemite rather than having to use an extension.

    Reply

  10. I’m not exactly thrilled about the Bing choice. This very much reminds me of American foreign policy principle of “enemy of my enemy is my friend”. Many examples exist in history, most vivid the one where Americans supported, trained and armed the Taliban during their uprising against the Soviet military intervention of the late 70’s and 80’s. Or Manuel Noriega in Panama.

    Microsoft was just recently a biggest threat to Apple’s existence, so going to bed with them now, in order to keep Google at distance is a questionable move.

    Reply

  16. I don’t understand. I feel that Google is evil, but Bing makes me throw up in my mouth, a little. Is Bing less evil? I just don’t know. Google, for the money, has the best user experience in search. I really would like to walk away from them and not feel empty.

    Reply

  18. Try Yahoo. To quote those ads that sell classic music, “They may be an oldie, but they sure are goodies!”. Yahoo is actually doing what they can to adapt to modern internet standards. They may not seem like much, but, to me at least, I get great service, and no privacy concerns. Soon, they will be as big, maybe bigger, than Google. And expect a Yahoo Phone too…that hopefully doesn’t rip off iPhone. I love that company.

    Reply

    1. I like Yahoo too, but, as has been noted, Bing powers Yahoo search, and has since 2009. And now this, Bing the default for Spotlight in both OS X and iOS. I’ve decided that I like this, despite a past marked by fear and loathing. Microsoft mildly providing back-end services is far better than their old dodge of providing goon squads in a protection racket, bumping off competitors, stoking the fires of coding hell, etc.

      Reply

      1. what a dumbass thing to say. Back then you hated MS, and now you convince yourself that you like their relationship with Apple?? God damn, learn to think for yourself instead of just following Apple like a damned idiot. Cant stand idiots like you…blindly following some group like some wild animal. Apple walks around getting pissy with other firms and is now showing their utter high-school maturity by getting angry over maps and search, etc. And dumbasses like you just go along with them because you can’t think for yourself and would rather that they do it for you.

        Reply

  19. Carrot2 blows away all of the bigger search engines–even the Duck. They limit searches to 5,000 per month, but you can also use Etools.ch which uses Carrot2 technology (or whatever the buzzword is). With Etools you can specify how important you want results from numerous search engines, including DDG, Blekko, and others. It makes the internet useful again. Would be so amazing if that were included in the standard search options.

    Reply

Reader Feedback

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,