From Brave’s Weblog:

Starting today, new Brave users will have the search functionality in the Brave browser powered by Brave Search, giving them the privacy and independence of a search/browser alternative to Big Tech. Brave Search is built on top of an independent index, and doesn’t track users, their searches, or their clicks. Privacy-preserving Brave Search now replaces Google as the default search engine used in the address bar for new Brave users in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom; Brave Search as default also replaces Qwant in France, and DuckDuckGo in Germany, with more geographies to be added in the next several months. Existing Brave users will keep their chosen search engine default, and can set Brave Search as the default search engine in Brave or most other major browsers.

I don’t use Brave as my default browser or search engine, but I’ve been keeping my eye on both. And although I’m unconvinced that their cryptocurrency features are much more than a gimmick, I really appreciate that they’re avoiding reliance on Google for funding.

Looking at Firefox, which peaked at around 30% market share 10–15 years ago, the biggest mistake they’ve made was to put themselves in a position where Google was their primary source of income. And now they’re primary source of income is also their biggest competitor, which just sounds like a terrible place to be without ever looking at any of the financials.

Brave is building for the future and, if they keep it up, I don’t think it’ll be too long before many of us switch our default again.

➝ Source: brave.com