Insights | Mobile

Top Two iPhone Search Engines Both Google

Google dominates search in the iPhone market, carrying as much as 97% of all iPhone search traffic, according to the latest data from online ad network Chitika.  That level of dominance begs the question, where does it come from?  Google has its app, its place in the Mobile Safari search bar, and of course its homepage.  As it turns out, if you consider the Google App and Safari to be different sources, Google controls the top two iPhone search engines.

The Google App, one of the more popular entries in the App Store, accounts for 8.68% of Google’s iPhone traffic.  The toolbar in Safari sends 49%, and 42.24% comes from the Google homepage and other minor sources.

Essentially, the Google App can stand on its own as the second largest search engine on the iPhone.  Yahoo! registers as the next search engine behind Google, but its 2.25% falls short of the Google App’s reach.  Bing is difficult to gauge, as traffic from the Bing app cannot be tracked at this time.  However, comparing the number of ratings for the Bing and Google apps in iTunes, Bing traffic could be anywhere between 1% and 4%.  At the highest estimate, all of Bing’s traffic is still only about half of the Google app.

Chitika’s recently launched mobile ad unit takes advantage of mobile search traffic, prompting new, deeper research into the mobile landscape.