New report by Kevin Indig analyzed the latest trends in Google’s market share in EU to find out why Google is losing its market share in that region. The biggest reason for this drop is Google being under tough circumstances, like a lawsuit against the company in the US to separate Chrome from Google, lawsuit against Google’s advertising business and Canada suing Google for its anti-competitive practices in online ads. Other searching mediums like ChatGPT and Bing are also attracting users and they are shifting on those mediums from Google. Google also has a lot of regulations in the EU because of their Digital Marketing Act (DMA).
Now this all raises the questions about how Google will get impacted if it loses its market shares in the EU even though it is doing good in terms of revenue. In the last 10 years, there was a -5.6 percentage points (pp) decrease seen in Google’s market share in France and a decrease of 3.3 pp in Germany. StatCounter reports that they have never recorded such low points in Google’s market share since 2009. Other EU countries have also seen decreases in market shares of Google, like Austria (-4.4 pp), Switzerland (-2.3pp), Denmark (-1.5pp), Poland (-3.1pp) and Netherlands (-2.1pp) in the last five years on mobile. In the past 12 months, the EU countries that saw the most decline in Google’s market share were France (-4.6pp), Austria (-3.2pp), Poland (-2.4 pp) and Germany (-2.1 pp).
A month after Android and Apple introduced choice screens for search engines and browsers, Google’s market shares started dipping and this means Google is not going to be a default browser on desktop mobile phones from now on. There are also some EU countries where Google’s market share falls flat, like Italy, Portugal, Ireland and Spain. This is because these countries saw a decline in Google’s market share on desktops and not on mobile phones. In the past five years, Google’s market share on desktop declined -10% as compared to -2.1% on mobile. It is because of Apple’s exclusive distribution agreement, with Windows OS being the most used desktop (75%) as compared to Apple’s MacOS with only 15.1% usage in corporate computing. Android also dominates the EU with 66.5% market share as compared to market shares of Apple (33%).
In countries like Portugal and Germany, Google’s decline in market shares started in November 2018. This is because of EU data protection law (GDPR) and EU fining Alphabet for antitrust violations. As Europeans care about their privacy, they started using Google search engine less which resulted in Google’s market share declining. The company that is getting the most advantage from Google’s decline is Bing, while ChatGPT comes close. Other search engines like QWANT and Ecosia may also come in the competition once they become independent. Google’s decline in market shares in the EU implies that there will be optimization for more search engines but Google's revenue may remain stable.
Images: Growth Memo.
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Now this all raises the questions about how Google will get impacted if it loses its market shares in the EU even though it is doing good in terms of revenue. In the last 10 years, there was a -5.6 percentage points (pp) decrease seen in Google’s market share in France and a decrease of 3.3 pp in Germany. StatCounter reports that they have never recorded such low points in Google’s market share since 2009. Other EU countries have also seen decreases in market shares of Google, like Austria (-4.4 pp), Switzerland (-2.3pp), Denmark (-1.5pp), Poland (-3.1pp) and Netherlands (-2.1pp) in the last five years on mobile. In the past 12 months, the EU countries that saw the most decline in Google’s market share were France (-4.6pp), Austria (-3.2pp), Poland (-2.4 pp) and Germany (-2.1 pp).
A month after Android and Apple introduced choice screens for search engines and browsers, Google’s market shares started dipping and this means Google is not going to be a default browser on desktop mobile phones from now on. There are also some EU countries where Google’s market share falls flat, like Italy, Portugal, Ireland and Spain. This is because these countries saw a decline in Google’s market share on desktops and not on mobile phones. In the past five years, Google’s market share on desktop declined -10% as compared to -2.1% on mobile. It is because of Apple’s exclusive distribution agreement, with Windows OS being the most used desktop (75%) as compared to Apple’s MacOS with only 15.1% usage in corporate computing. Android also dominates the EU with 66.5% market share as compared to market shares of Apple (33%).
In countries like Portugal and Germany, Google’s decline in market shares started in November 2018. This is because of EU data protection law (GDPR) and EU fining Alphabet for antitrust violations. As Europeans care about their privacy, they started using Google search engine less which resulted in Google’s market share declining. The company that is getting the most advantage from Google’s decline is Bing, while ChatGPT comes close. Other search engines like QWANT and Ecosia may also come in the competition once they become independent. Google’s decline in market shares in the EU implies that there will be optimization for more search engines but Google's revenue may remain stable.
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