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A three month review of kagi search and the orion web browser (2024)

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Re: A three month review of kagi search and the orion web browser (2024)

#11

Post by jazdw »

unlikelymordant wrote: post #4

I have used kagi for quite a while now, and i use it pretty much exclusively. I was unhappy with google ignoring many terms in my search queries and giving me results that I generally considered to be 'intro' pages and generic content, even when my searches were very specific. I have found kagi much better. I dont use any of the advanced stuff like summarisation or ai stuff, i just want search results that have my ke…

Google search is almost useless for anything but the most basic queries now. Anything technical and it ignores half of the search terms like you said.

Re: A three month review of kagi search and the orion web browser (2024)

#12

Post by SparkyMcUnicorn »

Kokouane wrote: post #2

Kagi is a tough pill to swallow. Their search is hands down the best around, there's no other way around it. That being said, $10/mo is also expensive. The workaround I found is using Kagi Ultimate. I get access to Claude (and I'm still able to attach files + access a dozen other LLMs) for $25/mo, so I was able to cancel Claude and keep Kagi and get the best of both worlds from either product. Side note: incredible t…

Agreed on Kagi ultimate.

The agents (optional with a toggle) hooked up to the LLMs are fairly decent. They'll search, grab YouTube transcripts, read online dev documentation, etc.

Re: A three month review of kagi search and the orion web browser (2024)

#13

Post by viraptor »

Kokouane wrote: post #2

Kagi is a tough pill to swallow. Their search is hands down the best around, there's no other way around it. That being said, $10/mo is also expensive. The workaround I found is using Kagi Ultimate. I get access to Claude (and I'm still able to attach files + access a dozen other LLMs) for $25/mo, so I was able to cancel Claude and keep Kagi and get the best of both worlds from either product. Side note: incredible t…

Unless you're a really heavy user, you can possibly save a lot on those LLM bills by using the API and some third party app. (Like Msty for example)

Re: A three month review of kagi search and the orion web browser (2024)

#15

Post by mulderc »

My brief review of Kagi: I’m never going back to ad-supported search.

I rely heavily on internet search for my job, and Kagi has made everything so much faster that I’ve almost stopped thinking about the search engine entirely. Google search had become frustratingly ineffective, often requiring me to dig deep to find what I needed. With Kagi, it just works. I rarely have to scroll beyond the first few results. In fact, Kagi’s effectiveness has made me search even more—now, I use it naturally without considering other services.

While this article highlights some valid concerns people may have with Kagi, I think the service is solid enough that everyone should give it a try.

Re: A three month review of kagi search and the orion web browser (2024)

#17

Post by janalsncm »

I remember reading the linked Dan Luu article [1] when it came out. It was much more even handed in addressing the question, in my opinion. In particular, he includes comparisons and analysis of specific queries. For some of them (e.g. “download YouTube video” or “ad blocker”) none of the search engines were even passable.

That’s the kind of side by side analysis you should be looking for.

The second point when people talk about Google getting worse is, is the Internet just getting worse? Maybe it’s both? Google’s interests aren’t aligned in the same way Kagi’s are, but if Kagi can’t keep blogspam out of its search results why are we blaming Google when they also fail to do so?

This is a genuinely hard problem and it’s interesting so I might take a look into it when I get a chance.

[1] https://danluu.com/seo-spam/

Re: A three month review of kagi search and the orion web browser (2024)

#18

Post by elashri »

forgotoldacc wrote: post #9

How well does Kagi work for places outside the US and non-English languages? I've only ever seen it mentioned by US users, so I have no clue how support is elsewhere. I briefly tried duckduckgo and its non-US/non-english search results seemed to be lacking (though this was about 2 years ago).

I use it with Arabic and I can say it is pretty good. I don't use technical searches in Arabic obviously but I find the quality of search in Arabic better than English without blocking many sites like I have with English. I live in the US though so the local results is not something I do in non-English.

Re: A three month review of kagi search and the orion web browser (2024)

#19

Post by whs »

forgotoldacc wrote: post #9

How well does Kagi work for places outside the US and non-English languages? I've only ever seen it mentioned by US users, so I have no clue how support is elsewhere. I briefly tried duckduckgo and its non-US/non-english search results seemed to be lacking (though this was about 2 years ago).

I use it for Thai result (and sometimes English result relevant to the Thailand region). I found the experience similar to Google. Not once that I need to !g, and the times I do wanted to check Google were producing similar garbage. It still doesn't filter blogspams (where a business website would produce low quality content to appears in keywords) nor pushing small websites - forums and personal blogs are almost non-existent in both result pages, even though it might have been popular result when searching for pre-social media era content.

The deranking & blocking feature doesn't help much as it only sort the result. There are multiple "web portal" that may be useful in one category (eg. entertainment news, travel content) but producing clickbaits in other category (eg. local news) so domain-wide blocking isn't exactly usable here.

Re: A three month review of kagi search and the orion web browser (2024)

#20

Post by karlshea »

janalsncm wrote: post #17

I remember reading the linked Dan Luu article [1] when it came out. It was much more even handed in addressing the question, in my opinion. In particular, he includes comparisons and analysis of specific queries. For some of them (e.g. “download YouTube video” or “ad blocker”) none of the search engines were even passable. That’s the kind of side by side analysis you should be looking for. The second point when peopl…

> Google’s interests aren’t aligned in the same way Kagi’s are, but if Kagi can’t keep blogspam out of its search results why are we blaming Google when they also fail to do so?

Because some of Kagi's results come out of the Google index, so Google could be doing at least as good a job as Kagi is and they are not.

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