Ecosia is an eco-friendly search engine based in Berlin, Germany that uses its profits to plant trees around the world. It offers a sustainable alternative to US-based search engines while maintaining strong privacy protections.

Why Choose Ecosia

Ecosia stands out for its environmental mission and transparent business model. For every 45 searches you make, Ecosia plants approximately one tree in areas suffering from deforestation. The company publishes monthly financial reports showing exactly how much money was earned and how many trees were planted.

Beyond its environmental focus, Ecosia respects user privacy. It doesn’t store searches permanently, doesn’t use third-party trackers, anonymizes all searches within one week, and doesn’t sell data to advertisers or create personal profiles.

Data Residency and Privacy

• Based in Germany with servers in EU
• Searches encrypted for security
• No permanent storage of search history
• No personal profiling or selling of data
• Limited data collection for service improvements
• Anonymizes all searches within one week

Features

• CO2-neutral search engine (runs on 200% renewable energy)
• Tree counter showing global impact
• Search results powered by Bing with Ecosia’s own algorithms
• Specialized search tabs for images, videos, and news
• Browser extensions for all major browsers
• Mobile apps for iOS and Android
• Tree planting projects in over 30 countries

Limitations

• Search results sometimes less comprehensive than Google
• Uses Microsoft Bing’s technology for search results
• Limited specialized search features compared to Google
• Revenue depends on users clicking on ads (though this funds tree planting)