Google search market share fell in May: BofA

Google’s (GOOGL) global search market share fell in May by 0.11% month-over-month to 90.8%, BofA analysts said, citing Statcounter data. Compared to the same period last year, the decline amounts to 2.31%.

Microsoft’s (NASDAQ:) Bing, on the other hand, experienced a small increase in share compared to both the previous month (up 0.08%) and the past year (up 0.95%), lifting its market share to 3.7%.

Other search engines, including Yandex, Baidu, Naver, DuckDuckGo, and others, saw a minor decline in share compared to the previous month (down 0.03%) but a slight increase year-over-year (up 1.30%), capturing a combined 4.3% of the market.

The mobile search landscape shows a similar trend. Google (NASDAQ:)’s mobile share dipped 5 basis points (bps) to 94.8%, while Bing’s mobile share rose marginally.

In the US, Google’s share grew 56 basis points on a monthly basis, with mobile share rising 40 bps and desktop down 35bps.

“After consecutive 8 months of decline, Google’s US Search market share increased m/m in May which could suggest AI overviews are aiding query growth & usage,” analysts wrote.

“We remain constructive on growing Gemini integration across the Google ecosystem & think broader AI overviews rollout will likely help drive higher usage & incremental ad spend over time. Moreover, with a focus on expense management, we think y/y margin growth in 2024 will be a bright spot & potential EPS upside driver.”