Google’s grip on search slipped below 90% for the first time in a decade

For the first time since 2015, Google is facing a shift that many thought was unthinkable: its share of the global search market has dipped below 90%.

According to recent data, the tech giant’s global search market share dipped below 90% for three consecutive months at the end of 2024—a milestone that hasn’t been seen since early 2015.

To put this into perspective, Google’s name has become synonymous with searching the internet. We don’t say we’re going to "search" for something; we say we’ll "Google it."

That linguistic dominance reflects the company’s market position—over 90% of online searches have been conducted through Google Search for the last ten years. However, a closer look at the numbers suggests the winds may be starting to shift.

According to Statcounter, Google’s global search market share slipped to 89.34% in October, 89.99% in November, and 89.73% in December. These numbers mark the first three-month period since early 2015 when Google’s share consistently fell below 90%. For context, the last time this happened, the figures hovered around 89.5% during the first quarter of 2015.

Interestingly, this shift doesn’t seem to be driven by ChatGPT or the rise of AI-powered assistants—at least not yet. Traditional search engine rivals like Bing, Yandex, and Yahoo appear to be reaping the rewards of Google’s slight decline. In December, Bing claimed the second spot with just under 4% of global searches, as shown in the Techloy chart below.