Independent Search Engines

NinjaCongo

52548

3346

Here's a list providing a wide range of specialized search engines and tools that can be used to find information beyond what typical search engines like Google provide. These tools cover areas like satellite imagery, legal documents, chemical data, cybersecurity, etc.

I haven't verified all of these myself, please comment if you find some of them don't work. And do expand and repost this list!

EDIT: I keep adding info from the comments to this list, don't know how many times Imgur will let me edit the post though.

https://www.ecosia.org/ - General search engine built on Bing that uses the revenue to plant trees, 250M so far
https://www.wiby.me/ - Searches only handcrafted human websites designed using minimal or zero CSS, that will run on vintage computers or early web browsers.
https://www.marginalia.nu/ - Finds only genuine sites buried under SEO spam
https://www.same.energy/ - Searches images by pure visual mood and feeling
https://www.tineye.com/ - Finds every website where any image ever appeared
https://www.sentinel-hub.com/ - Searches real-time satellite imagery of any location
https://www.zoom.earth/ - Searches live satellite and weather data globally free
https://www.marinetraffic.com/ - Searches real-time location of every ship at sea
https://www.flightaware.com/ - Searches live flight positions of every aircraft globally
https://www.flightradar24.com/ - Another global live flight tracker
https://www.n2yo.com/ - Searches real-time position of every satellite orbiting earth
https://www.space-reference.org/ - Searches complete data on every known space object
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/gene - Searches entire human genome and genetic sequence database
https://www.uniprot.org/ - Searches every known protein structure on earth completely
http://www.chemspider.com/ - Searches 100 million chemical structures and compounds free
https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ - Searches complete chemical data on any compound ever documented
https://www.guidetopharmacology.org/ - Searches every known drug target and pharmacological interaction
https://clinicaltrials.gov/ - Searches every medical trial happening globally right now
https://www.courtlistener.com/ - Searches millions of US court opinions and legal documents
https://pacer.uscourts.gov/ - Searches every US federal court case ever filed publicly (there may be a paywall)
https://free.law/recap/ - PACER documents that someone else has already paid for
https://www.judyrecords.com/ - Searches 330 million US court records completely free
https://www.opensanctions.org/ - Searches every global sanctions list and criminal watchlist
https://offshoreleaks.icij.org/ - Searches Panama and Pandora Papers for hidden wealth
https://aleph.occrp.org/ - Searches leaked documents exposing global financial crimes
https://globalfishingwatch.org/ - Searches real-time illegal fishing activity worldwide
https://www.globalforestwatch.org/ - Searches real-time deforestation anywhere on earth
https://earthdata.nasa.gov/ - Searches decades of NASA satellite environmental data free
https://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/ - Searches historical satellite imagery of any location
https://www.radioreference.com/ - Searches every radio frequency and scanner feed globally
https://www.broadcastify.com/ - Searches live police fire and emergency radio feeds worldwide
https://haveibeenpwned.com/ - Searches if your email appears in any breach database
https://dehashed.com/ - Searches leaked credentials across hundreds of breach databases
https://intelx.io/ - Searches dark web pastes leaks and historical breach archives
https://www.shodan.io/ - Searches every internet-connected device exposed globally
https://censys.io/ - Searches every publicly exposed server and certificate online
https://www.greynoise.io/ - Searches malicious internet noise separated from real attacks
https://netlas.io/ - Searches real-time internet assets for professional reconnaissance
https://publicwww.com/ - Searches raw HTML source code across the entire web
https://www.wolframalpha.com/ - Searches and computes answers from structured knowledge directly
https://ahmia.fi/ - Searches verified Tor onion sites safely from the clearnet
https://lebowskigifs.com - Will generate a random .gif from The Big Lebowski, and help find any dialogue from the film
https://deflock.me - Map and database of Flock cameras
https://epsteinexposed.com - Search the Epstein files

favorite_and_forget

search_engines

site_list

useful_links

Nagant

https://www.flightradar24.com/ is another planes in the air tracker.

3 months ago |

Added it to the list. Thank you!

iMcFly

Wiby’s description isn’t entirely correct. It’s a search engine for human crafted websites, yes, but it’s not exclusively old sites. The focus is on websites that are designed using minimal or zero CSS. This way you have somewhere to go to find websites that will run on really vintage computers / early web browsers.

SomebodythatIusedtonope

Saved in favorites till tomorrow when I will probably forget about its existence

216

abrubtopinion

I've never been so called out on the internet in my life. Are... are you in my house?

Rosfmmmhzdrozzley

That is the general trend I follow as well. Good to know I'm not alone

Lloripat

It makes me sad and I don't even know what they all do but I'm glad it exists.

yesdearmetoo

https://media3.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPWE1NzM3M2U1N2hua2NiMDd1aXhkaXhxcGd5MGl2NmdtaWR3ODhrajB2dm9mYW15NiZlcD12MV9naWZzX3NlYXJjaCZjdD1n/duM6JZemPlOjUyqmxd/200w.webp

theyallwenttoMexico

Same.😊👍

TheGodOfEverything

Into the pile it goes. I'll get to it eventually. Right..?

xizar

Don't use PACER. Use RECAP, instead. https://free.law/recap/

DildoMussolini

Why?

PACER is free info behind a paywall. RECAP is the subset of PACER documents that someone else has already paid for.

bamblebimble

tombeithemist

PACER, you have to keep up with. RECAP, you just sit back, relax, and get it re-told to you.

mrputter

linexnewt

Re: tineye, there is an extension to can add to Firefox (maybe others?) that lets you right click on an image in your browser and do a search from there via various sites. Tineye is one of them. It's called Image Search Options

MenloPart

I used to be able to right-click in Brave and reverse-image search, but my menu changed.

nevergoingtogiveyouupnevergoingtoletyoudown

Google used to be good... like a decade ago. Now Bing is better. Well... Bing is the same, Google just fell that hard.

anicyril

Does anyone know a search engine that still obeys boolean operators? I sure haven't been able to find a free one!

FattsoCattso

Save and forget

MurderousCoat

Tineye's not exactly infallible, it's not like it can search every single extant webpage ever. It had competitors before google image search existed because of this fact, and now google image search exists because of this fact. Still between the two you'll get a pretty comprehensive search.

>not using PlatinumEye https://media0.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPWE1NzM3M2U1Nzkwejhoc2NtOGVoOWN5ZWxvcjdlM3Q2MXBlamFjb3d6d2w4b3B6ZSZlcD12MV9naWZzX3NlYXJjaCZjdD1n/tL4jLpgqHA2ty/200w.webp

It's also outdated. I use google "search by image" parallel with tineye for identifying art when I post my dumps on here. Tineye is superior when it comes to finding anything posted a few years ago (it has the nifty "oldest" feature which can help find the OP, as well as resolution selection), but anything after 2024 is pretty hopeless. I guess they're not updating it?

EroticZombiePants

TinEye doesn't do much indexing of "adult" sites, so perverts are better served starting with Google.

OneGoodRib

I've used tineye for stuff I know is online and it's always like "idk I can't find anything"

I mentioned using Tineye recently and someone asked "That's still around?"
The thing I just used?
Yes.

HydraNine

Tineye very frequently comes up with 0 matches for me. Especially new/niche memes. *sad trombone*

StellarJay77

And this is eventually where AI tools will end up too (specialized for specific use cases). We are already seeing the cracks and big organizations now know that a general purpose AI model is not going to be a profitable long term business model as the amount of money going into it will not be offset by the amount of money they can get from people for using it. That's why the recent push to erect regulatory silos around themselves is happening to insulate and prevent the disruption of their plans

bad1080

let's not forget https://epsteinexposed.com to search the epstein files

Yellowlabexperiment

Used Flight Aware every time my wife flew somewhere without me. Cool site. Intuitive/easy.

jasondeslin

Anyone know a shopping search that doesn't include fucking Amazon or Walmart?

rocinanteismyhorse

That's an impressive list

I'll ask the real question on a bunch of people's minds: What does reverse image "research" better than Google?

[deleted]

3 months ago (deleted Apr 25, 2026 10:14 PM) |

I found that Yandex was better at finding a bunch of similar looking women than finding the exact woman you are checking on. Bing was the same. Tineye doesn't index too much NSFW stuff. No site is that good when it comes to identifying someone in pics with more than one person other than the primary person (like the person who first put it on their onlyfans). Finally, if you run into GIFs (in general, not just naughty stuff), places tend to index them by the first frame.

ButThisisntAboutMe

@420supercoolusername69

420supercoolusername69

Thank you!!!

NegasonicAdultEMP

I just switched over to duck duck go exclusively and it’s like the Stone Age over there. This might be helpful

And now I am going to watch True Blood again

Oh is that where that is from? Is that the one where they sparkle?

Absolutely no sparkly vamps on that one. HBO made extra dark dramady show that out did the source material by a mile. Fell off in the last few seasons but still worth watching

Best sample of the show…

https://youtu.be/wiCTUbwWfCY

AsABiologistWhoIsNotFunAtParties

DDG gets its search results directly from bing, the benefit is that your searches are private.

2 months ago |

That’s why I switched. Just getting reacquainted to search results that aren’t monetized. It’s been a while and I forgot how much things have changed

ArtisanFartisan

I pay for Kagi. It’s good enough for me and has no ads.

IAmASentientWaffle

Kagi is great. Never imagined paying for a search engine, but here we are...

PlancksKonstant

Agreed. Never thought that'd be what I paid for online, but worth it.

Salticido

Clinicaltrials.gov doesn't have every medical trial and is a US government website, not independent. It will likely skew towards US-based interventional studies, because US law requires they be posted. Observational studies generally don't have to be posted there. Other nation's laws will vary and they may have other websites. Also in my experience, searching this website is a pain unless you know the exact study number you're looking for. Titles are jargon & info will generally be summary.

RamanBiot

SEO?

calenti

SEO is optimizing against Google's search algorithm to get your page to show up at the top because most people don't go past the first page of results. It's a huge business and one of the things that helped drag the web into the lying hell it's become.

Anfalicious

One of the things that ruined the good internet

revelator

SEO Reedwagon

Better than my first guess, Sexually Explicit Ostriches.

Imustntrunaway

search engine optimisation - basically sites optimize themselves specifically so that they get to the front page, not because they contain what's being looked for, but because it checks the 'boxes' google looks for in the ranking, to the detriment of actual quality and usefulness. It's why you need to add 'reddit' to every search where you want help with a windows computer so you aren't fed an endless stream of unhelpful microsoft forum posts that aren't related to your issue for example.

ExTechOp

And the SEO field has so much snake oil you wouldn't believe.

RuminatingYak

That's not true at all. You think big websites like Reddit don't do SEO? Of course they do, that's precisely why you can find useful content to begin with. That's what SEO is for. The problems websites that care more about their ranking rather than providing anything useful, so they try to game the system and abuse SEO practices.

ihugpeople

Yes, but sometimes the search engines or seo has prioritized other sites and reddit will consistently give me a human response not a paid review or a site offering a software fix to solve the problem rather than the manual fix. Or finally, a not very related microsoft forum post that has a bunch of similar word but not actually related to my search.

I'm sure that reddit does seo, otherwise I'd not know the site exists to search for... but the actual quality of what I find on reddit is (regretfully) heads and shoulders better than 90% of the junk sites. that google inserts in front of what reddit has to say about what I'm looking up.

Ah. Thanks for the info!

NotAllowedToArgueUnlessYouPay

Or you search how to fix a simple computer problem only to find dozens of sites selling "programs" (wink wink) that will "fix" it.

This! Specifying the site one wants to search within (if you know, that is) helps. Add eg "site:imgur.com" to the search query.

imemewhatimeme

You can also exclude results from specific sites by adding "-microsoft.com" (for example) to the end of the query... Without quotes, of course.

If boolean operators work that day.

JBloodthorn

Use verbatim mode and they will. Under the input, far right under "Tools".

"All Results" -> "Verbatim"

b0stark

That's called "Google dorking". Or just "dorking", for those familiar with it. Allows for somewhat granular searches. Often used to find public/unsecured CCTVs, files, etc.

Pavloval

I'd like a way to get Duck Duck Go to stop feeding me Pinterest and Yandex to stop feeding me YouTube hits.

This will work for ddg image search.
search term -site:siteaddress.com or .net etc
example: crochet patterns -site:pintrest.com

As for yandex, I've seen where it has a drop down box that will exclude or only show for a specific site, but it only inconsistently shows up.

alcaray

All searching is a multi-step process. In your case "-pinterest -Yandex" should do the trick. eg.:

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=vintage+chevy&atb=v314-1&t=chromentp&ia=web">https://duckduckgo.com/?q=vintage+chevy&atb=v314-1&t=chromentp&a=web">a=web">https://duckduckgo.com/?q=vintage+chevy&atb=v314-1&t=chromentp&ia=we">ia=we">a=web">a=web">https://duckduckgo.com/?q=vintage+chevy&atb=v314-1&t=chromentp&ia=web
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=vintage+chevy+-price&atb=v314-1&t=chromentp&ia=web
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=vintage+chevy+-price+-sale&atb=v314-1&t=chromentp&ia=web
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=vintage+chevy+-price+-sale+-parts&atb=v314-1&t=chromentp&ia=web

On firefox, I use an extension called uBlacklist, and I've used it to do stuff like blocking every single AI image site I see when I search google images so I'm not having to dig through mountains of slop to find what I'm after. I'd see if that or similar might help you.
Also, I'm with you on not liking pinterest. Never liked that shit.

I'm a speech therapist and when I look for materials, I always need to include -pinterest.

deflock.me - map and DB of Flock cameras

boop66

This one is important, too. (JK) It will generate on-demand a random .GIF from, "The Big Lebowski", AND help find any dialogue from the entire film.

https://lebowskigifs.com

killergrooves85

What if someone who isn’t me wants to see pictures of boobs that aren’t AI generated?

spontaneous9

Check old forum pages that were posted prior to the genesis of AIs like craigslist forum 8008 or 1059.
CL forums banned pics due to overflow of political hate posts 2 (?) years ago but the forum pages are probably still up for viewing. A lot of the source sites that used to allow nsfw content died/ changed their rules since then so the pics people posted years ago might show error 404 when clicked but that's just how it goes (tumblr for example). You can go page-by-page back some 15yrs or more.

bbrtki

Id recommend everyone switches to ecosia.

The descriptions of the first two search engines are completely meaningless. That's not how search engines or SEO work.

dreikommavierzehn

I haven't looked into those two sites specifically because I honestly don't care. But in principle it's possible.
The first one could restrict searches up until the time period where SEO became widespread and popular. I do remember how the internet looked before it, and it was very different.
The second could just filter out commonly used and repeated seo stuff from the index page. But then again google does that too so I'm not sure how much differently someone could do that to justify the work

oldvydeo

TinEye used to be quite useful. Still is, just not like it used to. At least for me. I could find there almost any picture I wanted. Now it can barely found anything. But that's just my experience, though.

I use it and Google Images all of the time and regularly can't find stuff.
Tineye always makes me verify my humanity.

Mine, too. Pity.

DreamPhreak

I still use it a lot, just in case, but yeah its going downhill. Its like they dont check links for dead sites, and they slowed down their archive of newer images. (I know its not images exactly, its more like a fingerprint of an image.) Maybe the internet is just too big and fast now for them to keep up with all the new images.

circlebreaker

I back-traced an stock image searching for one of its use in memes earlier today (see below), there were 150+ pages of results, but I found it eventually. I don't use TinEye much, but it found plenty for me at least this time.

Maviyakuku

Good God's work done.

Especially how OP didn't actually check and verify any of these websites himself because he's "not getting paid".

Bro stop hating and do something constructive. https://media3.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPWE1NzM3M2U1OGZiY3l2M3g4ejFlbTdxd2hnaXRibW1jb3N4MzJhazZvdnNrM2JuNSZlcD12MV9naWZzX3NlYXJjaCZjdD1n/bI4ge1o6mcuBmGvstK/200w.webp

CanadianLadyMoose

I have far better luck with SmallSEOTools than with tineye

Tell me a bit more pls. Is it a regular reverse pic search?

I think so? It uses three search engines: google, which almost never finds the object i want (cos i use it to identify weird shit) one i never use and forget the name of, and Yandex, which i think might be russian? but almost always finds the obscure shit i am looking for and then i can just translate the page it links me to.

If you ever find some weird chunk of like, old iron farm equipment that nobody knows what it is or where it came from, 90% smallSEOtools with yandex will find it for you.

Tried it but you gotta pay. It did appear to find the obscure pic I served it tho.

https://smallseotools.com/reverse-image-search/ idk if imgur will let me post this but the link is safe to use if anyone wants to try it out. I use it mostly for identifying obscure objects that tineye cannot, using the yandex option.

HughGRecti0n

“I haven’t verified all of these myself.” — OP The problem in the social media age wrapped up in one sentence & why society is terrible. How about verify before posting?

I'm a journalist. If I get paid to publish something then I check and verify everything, during working hours. But I will not test out 38 individual sites before posting on Imgur. My assumption is that the majority of them do what they're described to do. Your mileage may vary.

fubizdaddie

Right so, you'll do the work of making the image, writing all the text, making the links, but not the work of verifying that the work is useful instead of wasted effort. You care that the people get the information but not enough to make sure it's worthwhile or accurate, because of your integrity as a journalist. Got it.

Cool so I have zero reason to trust that these are all good websites since the person who posted them hasn't done any research into them, thanks.

Exactly. It's a collection of links to search engines with the specific uses described. I found the list online, thought it was useful, having used several but far from all of these, made the links clickable rather than a jpg that forces you to punch in the address yourself and then I posted it. That's it. If this does not live up to your expectations of source research integrity, then I suggest you get your information from other sources, where the publishers are getting paid.

3 months ago (deleted Jun 1, 2026 12:50 AM) |

Nobody is asking for any posts on Imgur. It's a meme sharing site. This is a list of search engines. I can't take responsibility for how you use them or what results they give you. This is pretty obvious to most.

You DO see how explaining this and outing yourself as a journalist makes this worse, right? 😂

No. Pay me and I'll check every one of the 38 links. Or do it yourself. Or don't.

Or don't go out of your way to post a mountain of information if you're not willing to go out of your way to make sure it's worth posting? You know, nobody made you do this, so I woulda think you would by that merit alone want it to reflect positively on you, let alone BE USEFUL...

I find it useful. And a lot of other people seem, too. You sure go out of your way to criticize me posting this list. These are just tools, collected in one place, on a meme sharing site. That's all. They're there for anyone to test out. I do offer the honest disclaimer that I have not tested every one of these out myself. So how about you stop hating and make yourself useful. If you want to add to the list, which several people have, I'll be happy to edit the post. Or, post something yourself.

Imustupvotealltacos

What about porn?

You mean the absolute easiest thing to find on all of the internet? Learn a site you like and stay there, searching for new porn is how you infect your device.

ByThePowerOfSCIENCE

theporndude, or just google what you want followed by "porn" so safesearch goes for a walk

johnxbear

Why does my knee hurt? Porn

Eleshar24

I thought that once you were an adventurer like me.

Because of your knee-jerk reactions.

JSullenger

Knee jerking

eromitlab

that's what bing is for

rezpawner

Whenever I accidentally use bing (searching for things directly in windows for example), it always feels like the unwanted touch of a creepy uncle. There's something not right about bing. I bet bing is touching kids.

LespritDeLescalier22

The Temu of porn search engines

OCTAVlAN

I.am proud of a a very few things in my life. One of those are i have never watched an episode of the Kardashians, and I have never used Bing.

NorwegianSheepknuller

Sometimes I forget to change the search engine when first booting up windows and just type Firefox in the address bar and it Bing searches it for me.

Lol thats the worst. When my firefox opens it auto opens to my favorite search engine ( https://www.ecosia.org/ ) they plant trees when people use it. My friend told me Google is still best for searching 🌽 sites ... I swear my friend told me. .. 😎

choppedliveraldente

I've never shopped on Amazon. Except to get the peep sight for my Henry. One purchase.

Sassquatch0

You're missing out.
With Bing, and with an M$ account, you earn points whenever you use it. And those can be cashed out for real-world rewards - business gift cards, merchandise, even charity donations & non-profits! (wikipedia is an option)

I've earned 3 free months of Xbox Game pass just from porn searches. If M$ knowing I have a chastity & latex fetish is what it takes to leech free stuff from them, so be it. 🤷

https://media3.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPWE1NzM3M2U1MnR1emQwN25mNnVwa29sc3VvcXl2YXJiY3JveWRsaHc0MDlucXBkMyZlcD12MV9naWZzX3RyZW5kaW5nJmN0PWc/XHeLeuirRbwptHhSWd/200w.webp

Comet260

Cardassians are MUCH better.

mikeatike

Fucken eh. I always liked Damar how he kind if just lost it at the end and stayed drunk and then basicly got cardasia to wake the fuck up. Really good character. Dukat was a fucken lunatic and fucked up ya know he was smashing that old crusty fat bitch Kai Winn.

"They'll just make another copy of him, you know. You should've killed me. There's only one Damar." After Worf snaps the neck of a Weyoun.

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