Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Google Paid Apple $20 Billion in 2022 to Be Default Safari Search Engine
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
A shocking amount of people -don't care-.
Going back to college at 30 and the 18yr olds are basically desperate to give as much info to companies as possible for personalization/don't see a single problem in giving up every bit of privacy. They're tripping over themselves to give away their data. They grew up with lacking privacy/easy surveillance, so they don't seem to expect/want any form of it.
Last edited:
People talk about Apple being a monopoly in America or in the EU…
Ever heard of Google?
Ever heard of Google?
All hail mighty business. Only unfettered private profits matter. I want to be a slave to oligarchs.
I have Bing, Ecosia, and DuckDuckGo set as the default search engines on different devices. My gawd do they suck compared to Google. I try to use them, but wind up going to Google for any serious search. I really don’t want to use Google because I don’t like their anti-privacy business model. But their competition just isn’t competitive. If Google is considered a monopoly, it isn‘t their fault.
I think most people I know would say “just search it”.
I personally say “just AltaVista it”
I understand why Google pays this kingly sum—Apple’s platforms drive more traffic to Google than Windows and Android combined—but from a regulatory standpoint, this arrangement does not seem sustainable, and if for whatever reason it goes away, that would be a large chunk of Apple’s annual “services” revenue out the door.
Last edited:
I would assume that the very vast majority of iPhone users don’t change the search engine. I would even speculate that the majority don’t know you can, and aren’t familiar with the alternatives.
"Privacy is a fundamental human right. It's also one of our core values. Which is why we design our products and services to protect it."
... unless there is 20 billion on the line.
... unless there is 20 billion on the line.
Excellent. A win-win for both Apple and google.
When something needs searching my family never asks me anymore " Hey can you- don't bother he uses that weird search engine".
(Duck)
My brother last month experienced an extremely awkward moment when a very personal medical google search he did showed up on a linked computer in our family shop which an employee saw and reported as they thought somebody was using the work computer inappropriately.
Just duck it.
Last edited:
I use DDG, and it works fine for me 99% of the time. I can understand how for some users Google might be more comprehensive though. My search needs are usually very simple.
The deal is that Google pays Apple so they can track you. Apple values privacy above all else except money.
Considering Alphabet has gross product margins > 50% as primarily a services company, they sure are. Google's search revenue in Q1 2024 was reported to be $46 billion. Let's just conservatively say total yearly is $160 billion from searches, they have to be getting a significant portion of that revenue from people using Apple devices to pay about 12% of their overall search revenue to Apple.
But Safari (which they are paying for it to be the default search) by design blocks google trackers. iCloud if you subscribe hides your IP.The story behind this is very complicated. It isn't that simple despite the narrative being low hanging fruit.
Apple has added privacy features while (rightly as a public business) took this insane amount of basically free cash. People will EXPECT Google to be the default in this day and age... this is literally just taking free money. An insane amount of it apparently.
Last edited:
And this is the reason Google search is hot garbage. Complacency. They felt they didn't have to do anything but pay Apple to stay the default search engine and just sit on their a**. I dread using Google Search and hate accidentally typing my search in the address bar when looking for things on Amazon. But with their dominance and payouts, we never gave anyone else a decent chance so we ended up with hot garbage. Here's to the DoJ and AI hopefully giving someone else a shot.
what a waste of money since I immediately changed the default to something else 
People who only use "free" services like Google search may not have said It out loud but their choices definitely say "Duck It".
What, Google paying Apple $20 billion per year for this? If it stops, Apple's fiscal team would gladly raise prices to make up the lost revenue. $20 billion is about 25% of Apple's yearly services revenue. The money from Google is an extremely high margin income so it's strongly possible Apple would raise services prices 25 - 30% to cover the lost revenue. Or, Apple could raise prices about 5% across the board ($20 billion s about 5% of Apple's yearly revenue) to make up for the lost revenue; the reality of raising prices isn't that simple so it's likely prices would rise more -- 7 to 10%. Maybe that's worth it to you.
lol, haven’t used Google for at least five years.
That may be true but if you're using Apple devices then Google has definitely been using you for the past five years.
This is like the third time this story has run since the fact was revealed quite a long time ago.