For the first time in 9 years, Google’s global share of the search market has begun to decline, according to Statcounter data And Search Engine Land analytics. The drop indicates the beginning of a large-scale transition of users to alternative search engines: Bing, Yandex, Yahoo.
It is noteworthy that according to according to Cloudflarethe second largest search engine in the world is Yandex. Against this background, Google’s share in Russia itself is also declining. Let’s figure out how this happened and what it has already led to.
1. Google restricts Russians’ access to new search features
Google has deprived Russians of access to a number of the company’s functions and products, which creates inconvenience and forces them to look for alternatives.
Over the past two years, Google has launched several convenient features, including:
Generalized answer under the search bar
Dialogue mode directly in the search engine to clarify the query
Solving problems in a search engine and using photos
These functions are not available in Russia, but we found similar ones in Yandex:
Search with Neuro – a generalized answer from the AI under the search bar with links to sources
Clarifying a query in dialogue mode directly in Search with Neuro
Solving photo problems in the Smart Camera and search engine
The availability of smart neurotechniques on one platform and inaccessibility on another has led to the fact that Google’s answers in Russian are more often inaccurate.
An example. To the query “Number of transistors in M1,” Yandex Search with Neuro immediately gave an answer based on information from various sources.
Smart squeeze from Google does not work in Russian.
For our editors, the availability of AI tools in a search engine is an important factor when choosing a platform.
2. The distribution of traffic from Google and Yandex is changing
Another important point is the reduction in traffic coming to sites from Google. Many webmasters and website owners have noticed a significant drop in search traffic from this platform.
Like any website, we have traffic analytics systems. Accordingly, there are detailed statistics on where people come to iPhones.ru from.
We look at this data and see:
2022-2023: 37% for Yandex, 61% for Google
2023-2024: 44% for Yandex, 54% for Google
We have 7% growth for Yandex and a corresponding decrease in the share of Google.
If the trend does not change, in a year the share of traffic from the Russian search engine will increase from a third to a half.
It has tangible side both for the editors and for you, our readers. We try to optimize content for the source where the most traffic comes from.
Previously, articles, headlines and content of posts were adjusted to suit what came up better in Google searches. Now we focus on topics that are relevant to queries in Yandex. Of course, a certain balance is still maintained, but the focus is shifting.
It’s not just the volume of traffic, but also in his capacityas well as in the return of optimization efforts. Since we started optimizing themes for Yandex, the result has become more predictable – and the traffic itself, being Russian-language by default, turned out to be better in a number of key metrics.
3. The market reacts to changes in the quality and availability of search engines
Since the beginning of 2020, it has become more difficult to find relevant information on Google, which also affected its market share.
I provide statistics on the use of two search engines in Russia from several sources. Let’s look at the data first Yandex.Radarthe service shows how people use the Internet in Russia, provides reports on search engines, browsers, device types and operating systems:
Indicated in red Yandexblue Google
■ 2019: 57/40
■ 2020: 60/38
■ 2021: 61/37
■ 2022: 63/36
■ 2023: 65/35
■ 2024: 67/33
The biggest role in the change in share is played by iPhone owners – or more precisely, iOS users.
How iPhone owners changed their preferences:
In November 2021 Google processed 57% of requests in Russia. Then its share began to decline. Yandex then had a share of 43%.
In November 2024 year the situation is the opposite. Only 43% of Russians with an iPhone search for information on Google. 57% of requests are processed by Yandex.
According to another source – service Statcounterin June 2022, Yandex and Google had equal shares in search queries and handled 48% each.
The graph shows that in November 2024 Yandex already occupies 73%and Google’s share dropped to 26%.
Trend: Google is not leaving Russia, it is being abandoned.
The transition of users from Russia from Google to Yandex seems to have become the most natural example of the transition to domestic analogues of software and services. Perhaps Google itself, by its own actions alienated iPhone owners in Russia. Yandex, on the contrary, has strengthened itself and added AI capabilities in Russian, which Google is definitely not going to catch up with.
Where to go in this case for answers to questions? The question is rhetorical. Therefore, I began to visit Yandex more often for quick answers from Neuro. But previously I always refused to install the browser and search for the company by default.
Statistics prove that I am not alone. Even among iPhone users, for whom Google usually works out of the box, there are millions of defectors.
Source: www.iphones.ru
