Startpage.com Reviews 

Generally, I don't mind this search engine. It gives me better results. But, recently it has added junk buttons below the search bar. In addition, it has made the search bar a fixed width which is not long enough for most generalized searches - now it looks like it's being forced into a Mobile Portrait frame on a desktop. Not only is it a horrible UIX choice, it is poorly thought out. It should be a variable width based on the size of the window. At the *very* least, it should be something *we* have control over.

I was content with Startpage for a while until about a month ago it started showing capcha's. And quite often. I switched back to Duckduckgo.

Shockingly bad. Takes a shotgun approach to results... Very little of what is offered has any relevance to what is put in. It seems impossible to direct it to focus.

outdated and annoying CAPTCHA. puts burden on legitimate human users.

It's a absolute piece of junk, slow, very slow, glitches all the time, unresponsive, stalls, then bombs out of the page for no reason back to the search, it holds you search results etc etc, honestly it's so ameturistic

I was so happy to see a startpage engine become available mostly for its privacy concerns. I have used it as a default search since the Ixqick days.
Then, I see that you cannot see or copy your passwords. That did it for me. Why do they show the options when you can't use them?
Back to Firefox I go.

Started off good but now is storing my history, even if I am in a private window and won't let me clear it! Bye Bye!

Felt I had to post a review here as many (most/all?) of the one-star reviews just don't seem to correspond with my experience of using Startpage. I use it successfully all the time with my VPN (NordVPN) without having to make any changes. I always seem to get plenty of relevant, useful answers. After going into the settings page, I don't get any nags and I don't see any sponsored results. The interface is clean. I previously used DuckDuckGo but found that it often left out important results when compared to Startpage. Your mileage may vary but for me its a definite recommendation.

unitedkingdom-startpage.com used to give me some good advices about anything related to gambling they should get the credit for it

Was informed by Waterfox that "DuckDuckGo is no longer available for use in Waterfox, your default search engine has been changed to Startpage". Not only was DuckDuckGo still available in the default search engine settings, it still worked completely fine. It's obvious they paid the developers of Waterfox a nice sum to change everyone's default search engine to theirs. Appalling behavior that no trustworthy company would ever do. Avoid!

I live in UK. I have used Startpage for many years. It uses Google and Bing to search and returns results generated by these USA search engines thus results are very heavily biased to USA sources. This is why, for example, if you search for health info you get dozens of USA private healthcare and 'wellness' websites before you see NHS information. Startpage used to filter out the worst rubbish but it is no longer as effective in cleaning up the American results before you see them. As Google and Bing have stopped focusing on useful results and instead changed (over the last few years) their software to promote 'sponsored results' i.e. adverts that owners have paid Google and Microsoft to promote and (in the last year) 'AI enhanced' results - what AI guesses you want rather than what you asked for - so results have become less and less useful. Startpage used to be about service but was itself bought by an advertising company about three years ago with a vested interest in pushing 'sponsored content' i.e. adverts at you. All-in-all, this means Startpage is no longer the excellent search engine it once was - only a few years ago! how quickly the internet has been 'enshittified'! - and is now just as bad as its USA-monopolist sources. Personally, I switched to an open source, privacy focused search engine as my default. It is based on the Searx project. I use the version of searx called searxng. There are about 70 search engines based on searxng, I use a UK-based searxng as my default but shop around for others if I need special kinds of search results e.g. images, code, archived content, academic papers etc. If you hate what corporate greed and American fascism has turned the internet into, you might prefer one of the hundreds of searx-based search engines.

Like all "search engines", it just pushes whatever agenda the gov tells them to push. If you want to know what the Kardashian did or what influencer were at x event, they are useful. But basically anything "sensitive" is not allowed to be discussed. But instead of saying that, see censored search results.
All while they reply with just following the law aka "just following orders".
Sound familiar?..

Repetititve and irrelevant search results

StartPage's downfall started a few years ago. It began with limiting search result. After that, it was preventing VPNs from accessing the site despite pretentious claims about caring for people's privacy. Now, I cannot even access the site as often anymore because of a connection issue. Other sites do not give me any issues at all. Do not rely on StartPage. It is an overrated search engine.

BE CAREFUL - I just lost all 50 curated open tabs on a restart having set Startpage to be my, um, start page.
No warning of this - just find out for yourself kind of attitude.
When switching something as in-use as a search engine, someone should make it clear exactly how this will change your setup.
What else don't I know? I don't know....
Proceed with caution. And I'm not the only one - check Reddit.
Some setting somewhere I'm sure, but its not just me being stupid.
Proceed with caution - or turn on private browsing in Safari.
I am not even going to see what search results this gives me.
So, Startpage - you should work better on your intro.

I decided to try the smart page app has an alternative to other search engines, and by the end of the day was diminishing my Google use and deleted Duck Duck Go as the alternative search engine which I rarely used anyway. Within 2 days, I was using smart page 95% of the time and only used Google for quick results due to better results for quick answers to questions. But that's not good enough to keep it as my main page, and I'm 100% satisfied with smart page, especially the zapping feature which I utilize several times a day as assurance. Search results for smart page aren't as good as Google, but that is a minor default compared to the pluses I've encountered. I tried vpns and wasn't very happy with certain pages being blocked, but I feel secure on Smart page, much more so than any other search engine I've ever used.

For years I've used Startpage and don't even bother with any others plus it's very private

extremely pee poor... I dont know how this ended up my home page but it took over my home page I think through a dodgey stream and is the worst browser ive ever experienced and has to trick people into using because its the worst cash grab attempt of a browser offering absolutely nothing unique and a worse and completely irrelevant alternative, it has really angered me pushing awful notifications spam stuff and scam stuff...

I can't get a accurate answer.
I ask about license plates about old and new and deceitful representation on a vehicle, and I get nothing.
This search engine is worthless.

Not much difference then google I actually am fed up with them there powered by the Google search engine there just google under disguise I don't trust them and recommend a alternative I have had target me with messages before then dental of it by them I don't know if they can track people commiting a crime well but if they do there's going be a double standard with them privacy protection doesn't actually hide you from the government so it doesn't actually work so I won't recommend it as it's a fake tool European privacy protection act I won't trust as none of the countries in the EU are trustworthy with the database am sure the uk & USA and 14 eye's are no better with you're database plus the misquoted as well