Google may be the world's most popular search engine, but that doesn't necessarily mean it is the best. Don't forget, Google is notorious for tracking users and logging search activity. Not to mention, there are many other search engines out there, such as Microsoft's Bing, Yahoo, and DuckDuckGo to name a few.

Believe it or not, a lesser-known search engine, Startpage.com, has defeated Google (and all others) to become the search champion! You see, following an in-depth investigation, German organization "Stiftung Warentest" has declared the search engine to be the best. Not familiar with that organization? Please know, it is similar to Consumer Reports in the USA. So yeah, this is a big deal. And yes, Startpage.com also defeated fellow privacy-focused search engine DuckDuckGo.

"The testing involved comparing 50 search queries, that in some cases included typos, vague descriptions, and other ambiguities. Then the relevance of the first six search results was evaluated. The quality of the results were then reviewed in light of other search engine features and policies," says StartPage.com.

Robert Beens, the company's CEO explains, "We are honored to achieve first place in this test. It shows that private search has come a long way and that it's not necessary to track people to attain award-winning service and profitability."

While this is certainly good news for Startpage.com and the privacy community overall, "best" is obviously subjective. In other words, if you don't care about privacy and tracking, Google could possibly be the best for you. Hell, I know some folks that swear Microsoft's Bing is the greatest. With all of that said, StartPage.com provides Google search results without all the tracking -- it's the best of both worlds!

If you want to read the study in full yourself, you can do so here. While it is in German, a translation service should make it totally readable.

Will you give Startpage.com a chance now that it has been declared the "best" search engine? Do you already use it? Please tell me in the comments below.

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