by miked85 on 10/12/23, 12:34 AM with 212 comments
by Lazare on 10/12/23, 2:14 AM
* Google search was good, but has been steadily getting worse. Over the last 1-3 years it's become actively unplesant.
* DDG solves a lot of privacy issues, but the search quality is strictly worse than Google. I know people who use it preferentially, and I respect that, but personally Google search is already so bad than opting for something even worse is hard for me to accept. And I think almost every DDG user is familiar with having to fall back to Google to get a result.
* Kagi solves the privacy issues and the search quality is excellent - certainly better than Google is today, and subjectively, feels as good at least as good as Google was at its heyday. And notably I have never needed to fall back to Google; it's just a strict upgrade. I absolutely feel it's worth the cost.
I can't really predict if it will stay good; some of the decline in Google is no doubt just because they're the most popular SEO target, so it's possible if Kagi becomes wildly popular it'll be a victim of it's own success. And of course, Kagi's goals and principles may change with time, etc.
But as of today, if you think you might get some value from really good search, and Kagi isn't wildly out of your price range, give it a shot.
by archildress on 10/12/23, 1:43 AM
by adamsb6 on 10/12/23, 1:48 AM
This is a widely held misconception, but there's no legal requirement to maximize profits. They're required to act in the interests of the corporation and its shareholders, but this is very broad and includes more than just wringing out every source of profit.
I'm a recent Kagi convert, and I'd say that Google's search product declining in usefulness is eventually going to impact its profitability.
by simpaticoder on 10/12/23, 1:27 AM
As it is, we only believe that "users paying for services" will protect against data exfiltration because of very naive reasoning, or, perhaps more accurately, praying.
by upghost on 10/12/23, 1:51 AM
If you precede the search query with `!expert` you get an LLM search response.
If you precede it with `!code` you get a GPT-4-ish tuned response. It’s… really good. And since you can do it from a browser bar if you make it your default browser, I find myself reaching for !expert at least 50% as often as ChatGPT these days. Also, it’s extremely good with citations. The !expert mode seems pretty darn up to date, no knowledge cutoff issues. I have no idea if it is search, doing a vector lookup, or they just bake the model every night. Totally magical.
Also, I’m following the LLM stuff pretty closely these days — their universal summarized and their search LLM — no one else is doing that right now. It’s genuinely amazing.
by Yeri on 10/12/23, 1:46 AM
Tried to convert my wife to use it, but she's too used to Google (and the integration with Maps, local recommendations for cafés and restaurants, etc) that don't work as well in Kagi (yet). But for day to day, proper searching, it's 100% better.
And I can't stress enough how liberating it is to see the top results of the search are actually most likely the most relevant results (and not "they paid more"). Yesterday I had to set up a clean Windows laptop, and had to use Edge to install Chrome (or Firefox) and 1password: it's just pure lying to users: https://media.m.superuser.one/media_attachments/files/111/21... (that top banner with download 1password doesn't actually do anything, the next results, made to look like a real result with the sublinks etc is all lastpass cheating and paying to be in front of 1psw).
by justusthane on 10/12/23, 1:43 AM
The enduring (and incorrect) myth of how fiduciary responsibility works.
by ketzo on 10/12/23, 2:12 AM
Or is “picking a different search engine” gonna be something only 1% of users ever do again?
I honestly think that even if Kagi does remain pretty niche (<1% of internet searches, for a ballpark), that’s great if it can really serve that niche (so far… mostly HN-user-types, I would bet).
But it seems hard to make money at that scale and with a non-advertising business model. So godspeed Kagi, I guess.
by lampiaio on 10/12/23, 1:56 AM
by lapcat on 10/12/23, 1:53 AM
I would have been happy to pay if the results were good, but unfortunately I was disappointed by them.
by jdoss on 10/12/23, 1:36 AM
If you are on the fence on paying for a search engine give it a shot for a month and you might be as surprised as to how good Kagi is as I was.
by jonjojojon on 10/12/23, 2:10 AM
by Urgo on 10/12/23, 1:59 AM
I wish there was more example results then just "best headphones", "steve jobs", and "python exceptions". I'm interested, but not interested enough to sign up. Maybe its just me, but all the marketing and comments are why to switch away from google search.. which I already did.
There is a docs page[1] on Kagi vs. DuckDuckGo but it doesn't really have any compelling reason to use Kagi from that. I'd love to see concrete examples of how Kagi has better results then DDG.
[1] https://help.kagi.com/kagi/why-kagi/kagi-vs-duckduckgo.html
by necovek on 10/12/23, 2:40 AM
However lately, I've found that it started sucking a lot more when it comes to localised search. I am actually not seeing the value and quality I've seen early on, and will likely stop paying for it as I increasingly do have to fall back to Google.
by Semaphor on 10/12/23, 2:24 AM
Can’t speak for the mac-only browser, but for the two general browsers, it’s only a post-installation setting, the extension is if you don’t want to change the setting manually (including the private browsing session URL setting) and get some extra features.
by darkteflon on 10/12/23, 1:51 AM
by tynan on 10/12/23, 1:50 AM
by theshrike79 on 10/12/23, 5:39 AM
I've never heard anyone say anything bad about it - and we're still talking about a $10/month search engine. Something that has been historically free at all times.
by catgirlinspace on 10/12/23, 2:52 AM
by andreagrandi on 10/14/23, 12:00 PM
Due to a Safari limitation, all the queries are leaked to the previously selected default search engine https://kagifeedback.org/d/1575-ios-extension-leaking-search...
In addition to this, since all the search attempts are being redirected to Kagi, you can’t use any other search engine unless you deactivate the extension and this prevents you from trying the same query on different engines.
P.S: as far as I understand, they don’t have much freedom with the implementation and everything would be much easier if Safari allowed to customise the search engines, but I’m not sure this limitation is being properly communicated to the users (unless I missed some warning during extension installation)
by mortify on 10/12/23, 1:52 AM
Google's only advantage over other search engines is its ability to search forums more deeply. The build-in feature of diving into reddit, stack overflow, etc is often useful. After a few test searches, Kagi is adept at this as well.
Other free search alternatives that I've been happy with include: Ecosia, Quant, or even startpage.
by malablaster on 10/12/23, 1:47 AM
by gxs on 10/12/23, 2:16 AM
I’ve grown such a disdain for google, far cry from when I stood in the long lines to buy the first android phone.
I’m starting to feel the same way about Apple, in fact, I think if it weren’t for messages I’d actually be willing to try something else.
by guillemsola on 10/12/23, 9:31 AM
Maybe this was tweaked to be catchy for developers but I don't think is the right thing to see as the second entry.
If you search for exceptions you want to learn how they work, that is what 99% of the people would need. An entry like this is dangerous for instance if you are just someone trying to learn about them.
IMO this is a red flag about the quality for a search engine. Maybe they are just targeting seasoned tech people who would see this content interesting. But definitely not a search engine for the masses.
by shepherdjerred on 10/12/23, 2:41 AM
Years ago when I tried out DDG, I found myself appending !g to every query, and I thought that Google Search would always have a place in my life, but Kagi results are _so_ good.
So, once YouTube has a viable replacement I might be able to delete my Google account.
by MiddleEndian on 10/12/23, 4:00 AM
by tentacleuno on 10/12/23, 1:34 AM
This seems like a shame. I'd love to understand more re: how they come up with those prices in the first place, if any information is available.
It would also be interesting to explore how many of the people praising it here and elsewhere are paying customers.
by dotnet00 on 10/12/23, 3:02 AM
by sampli on 10/12/23, 1:52 AM
by mantra2 on 10/12/23, 3:10 AM
by Ephil012 on 10/12/23, 2:42 AM
Let me give an example. On Kagi, I searched up "Overcoming addiction to Reddit". On Kagi, most of the top results are actually just Reddit posts about drug addiction / addiction in general and not Reddit addiction [1]. If you scroll down, the is a result about internet addiction, but that isn't what I asked for either. Only once you get to the very bottom do you actually get links about Reddit addiction itself. Even then, there aren't that many.
If you do the same query on Google, I get much more results that are actually about Reddit addiction [2]. On top of that, the relevant results are way closer to the top than on Kagi. It even includes high quality links like a Hacker News post on Reddit addiction. I believe Kagi included the same link, but it was hidden all the way on the third page as opposed to being somewhat near the top on Google. Don't get me wrong, Google's results aren't perfect and it has a lot of irrelevant stuff show up in my query about Reddit addiction. But it's still better than Kagi.
My theory is that Kagi just saw the words "overcoming addiction" and "Reddit" and assumed I wanted to look for links about addiction in general on Reddit. Basically it's almost like it did "overcoming addiction site:reddit.com" for the top results. Albeit, after the top results it does show links from other sources. Meanwhile, it seems Google did a better job at parsing the query and realizing I was looking up a specific type of addiction, a Reddit addiction. Kagi did not do this.
My next problem with Kagi is just the lack of results in general. It seems Kagi likes to return a limited number of results per search. It seems it usually gives 20-30 results and sometimes gives more (~70 results) if you give it a very generic query. The problem with this is it makes Kagi terrible for research. In daily life, I never even read past the first few pages on Google. But when researching a niche topic for a paper, you sometimes need to go way past the first page to find what you're looking for. This might be because when doing research on something vague or niche it's hard to get accurate matches on the first page of search. As a result, having a large number of search result pages in general is useful for when this happens. But Kagi simply doesn't do this. It's limit on how many results it returns just kills the ability for you to actually go more in-depth without issuing a modified search query. I seriously doubt Kagi's index is literally so small it can only return around 70 something results at max, so I just have to think this is some self-imposed limitation which ultimately harms the search quality.
Another problem I have with Kagi are lenses. Lenses get hyped up by them, but in practice I found them utterly terrible. I searched up Lo Mein without lenses on and my first results were some pretty high quality recipes. I then turned on the recipe lens and the quality noticeably decreased. Instead of returning Lo Mein recipes from actual recipe sites, it instead returns a Reddit post that links to a gif of someone making Lo Mein. Issue is that gif is actually on gfycat which is shut down. So the top result is useless. The rest of the results aren't even Lo Mein recipes, but instead chicken recipes for instance. So in the process of trying to use lenses to increase my search quality, it actually made it worse.
Also, a tiny nit is that Kagi isn't as good at getting quick answers. If I look up a question on Google, it will usually display some quick summary at the top with the answer to the question. Kagi has quick answer too, but you have to manually click on it to get Kagi to generate the quick answer. I get they're a startup trying to save money, but this is just another reason for me to use Google over Kagi.
As a whole, I haven't found Kagi to be useful at all like many commenters claim it is. I really wanted Kagi to work out as again I love the idea of Kagi. But ultimately, I can't justify using it over Google because the quality has just been so much worse in my experience. Ultimately, I am paying money for Kagi, yet I am getting a lower quality product than Google which is free. At that point, it doesn't make sense for me to continue with Kagi.
1. https://kagi.com/search?q=overcoming+addiction+to+reddit
2. https://www.google.com/search?q=overcoming+addiction+to+redd... (Google may show different results to you because Google might be customizing results based on past searches)
by wutwutwat on 10/12/23, 6:22 AM
by rogeliodh on 10/12/23, 2:22 AM
by northerdome on 10/12/23, 1:47 AM
by bravetraveler on 10/12/23, 3:16 AM
I'm willing to pay to a degree... but honestly, I'm not that compelled by AI/LLMs and get heartburn from utility billing.
by solarkraft on 10/12/23, 3:16 AM
I used it when it was free and while it was fine, I didn't feel enough of a difference to DuckDuckGo/Google for it to be worth it to switch permanently.
by snvzz on 10/12/23, 2:15 AM
by EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK on 10/12/23, 7:22 AM
by gwbas1c on 10/12/23, 3:00 PM
by renegat0x0 on 10/12/23, 7:04 AM
I searched "Elon Musk" in kagi and Google. I see the results with more text on Kagi. It is more dense. Google shows me more of blank space.
The second thing is domain variety. "Elon Musk" on google shows twice wikipedia, twice CNBC, twice new york times, twice guardian. Mainstream domains are shown several times, with similar titles. Kagi joins groups that nicely.
I searched for "diablo 2 mods". I was expecting hobby pages, fan pages, with forums, mods, wallpapers, maps. It is all gone. Nobody hosts sites like that? The ones there were - are they gone? Has it all split into reddit, nexusmods, facebook groups? Can Google search facebook and reddit now easily? Why such groups are not showed on results, only r/diablo?
I feel that whenever I search something media outlets appear first. Even when searching for mods ign shows with some articles.
Is google a good tool for discovery, or just for searching a precise information like "how to solve this x compilation error"? Has Internet become a dull place because people are consoomers now, not creators? Or people are just focused on creating food images on an Instagram? There is no sense of wonder with results. Maybe my expectations are too high?
by dang on 10/12/23, 2:56 AM
Ask HN: How to Pronounce Kagi? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37616169 - Sept 2023 (12 comments)
Unlimited Kagi searches for $10 per month - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37603905 - Sept 2023 (944 comments)
Kagi search is 6 times faster than Google - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37588686 - Sept 2023 (5 comments)
Kagi Small Web - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37420281 - Sept 2023 (185 comments)
Ask HN: Is paid search-engine model like Kagi viable? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37374900 - Sept 2023 (22 comments)
Kagi Search Stats - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37315961 - Aug 2023 (55 comments)
Kagi Number of Users and Searches Stats - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37313141 - Aug 2023 (6 comments)
Ask HN: How can Kagi be so fast and customizable? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37065082 - Aug 2023 (15 comments)
Most promoted and blocked domains among Kagi Search users - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37006082 - Aug 2023 (485 comments)
Kagi: Words You Cannot Use: 'Constitutional AI', 'Anthropic', 'Anthropic, PBC' - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36741153 - July 2023 (51 comments)
Kagi raises $670k - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36517149 - June 2023 (359 comments)
Updates to Kagi pricing plans – More searches, unrestricted AI tools - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36040346 - May 2023 (77 comments)
Enhancements to the Kagi Search Experience - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35809082 - May 2023 (163 comments)
Important Clarifications and Apology Regarding Kagis' Pricing Update - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35149788 - March 2023 (10 comments)
Kagi – Paid Search Engine - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34179949 - Dec 2022 (166 comments)
The Age of PageRank Is Over - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33537513 - Nov 2022 (373 comments)
Kagi/Orion status update: First three months - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32676993 - Sept 2022 (191 comments)
Kagi search and Orion browser enter public beta - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31584791 - June 2022 (201 comments)
Kagi: A Premium Search Engine - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29835756 - Jan 2022 (221 comments)
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(Reposts are fine after a year or so, and links to past threads are just to satisfy curious readers)
by chx on 10/12/23, 1:45 AM
I was beginning to see way too much of these weird domain name mirrors of things in Google Search instead of the real things and I was reading Doctorow on Google's enshittification and I said "OK, enough of this".
I guess it's time to move Google Drive and Gmail as well. The latter is probably fastmail but where to put the Google Drive files? It's like 2TB.
by 2-718-281-828 on 10/12/23, 9:23 AM
does kagi also censor illegal content or content residing in a gray zone? like porn, streaming movies, torrenting, racism etc
does kagi censor so called fake news and dangerous misinformation with regard to corona for example?
by titaniumtown on 10/12/23, 1:36 AM
by iansinnott on 10/12/23, 1:35 AM
I'm still a happy Kagi user but I found that lens helpful for avoiding over-SEOd sites filled with affiliate links and was disappointed to see it gone.
