DuckDuckGo says it saw a “sustained surge” in US installs after Google’s AI-soaked I/O developer conference.
According to Engadget the privacy-focused search engine said its US app installs rose 18.1 per cent across six consecutive days, peaking at 30.5 per cent on 25 May. Most of the fresh installs came from iOS, where iPhone growth averaged 33 per cent week on week and peaked at 69.9 per cent on 25 May.
Google used I/O to cram more AI into Search, including agentic features and a dynamic search box that makes traditional search look like a museum exhibit. It was part of a wider AI splurge, with Google Spark, Gemini Omni, AI video tools and more details about its Android XR platform.
The reaction was mixed with some users wondering why every search now needs a robot intern attached.
Visits to DuckDuckGo’s AI-free search page, noai.duckduckgo.com, rose 22.7 per cent week on week and peaked at 27.7 per cent on 24 May.
DuckDuckGo said the US growth was several times larger than its international expansion, suggesting Google’s US-focused announcements gave it a handy shove.
DuckDuckGo chief executive Gabriel Weinberg said: “ Google is force-feeding AI with no way to opt out. As a result, their results are getting worse, not better. We want to be the place that puts users in charge and allows them to decide how much or how little AI they want. That’s why we’re seeing a spike in people coming to DuckDuckGo this week; it’s as simple as that.”
DuckDuckGo is hardly about to mug Google in a dark alley and nick its search empire. Still, the numbers show that some users are fed up with being handed AI when they only asked for a normal web result.
There is a small catch. DuckDuckGo has AI features of its own, including tools that resemble Google’s error-prone AI Overviews. The difference is that DuckDuckGo lets users switch them off, which now counts as radical user choice in a tech industry obsessed with mandatory cleverness.
