this post was submitted on 27 Mar 2024
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Privacy
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DDG queries can't really be written the same way you'd write one in Google if you're after effective results. It'll take some time to get used to it, tbh I was using DDG alongside Google until I fully switched.
I keep reading that Google’s search results are supposedly much better than DDG’s when my experience is the exact opposite. I don’t even live in an English speaking country and the results I get are a vast improvement over Google’s. It has been this way for me since at least last year, but in my experience DDG had caught up to Google in 2022 already. It could also be that Google has just deteriorated a lot in the last two years (which it definitely has, judging by all the bad publicity they’ve been getting for it), so I’d urge you to give DDG/Brave Search/Bing/Kagi/SearxNG another chance.
I’d also recommend setting an alternative of your choice as the default everywhere and to use it exclusively for like a week before making up your mind about that specific product!
Do you mean grammar-wise, or special operators?
Grammar, I've noticed I get much better results if I word things more directly instead of like a question
I've never used questions to search, I use keywords, even with Google. So if I want info on the Russia-Ukraine war, I'll search "Russia-Ukraine War". If I want casualty numbers, I'll add "casualties" there, probably at the start if I want to emphasize it. Searching "how many people have died in the ukraine war" has never been something I do.
That said, natural language search may be more useful with AI tools though, but for regular search, I've always used keyword-dense queries, roughly ordered by priority in the query (important terms first).
They probably mean grammar, since most Google operators do work. If there's a specific difference in search syntax (other than bangs) though, I'd love to know what I've been missing.