Plenty of engines claim they do not track you. A handful actually live up to it. Here is a short, honest list of the ones worth your time, and what sets each apart.

The shortlist at a glance

featureduckduckgostartpagebravemojeekbare
no behavioral tracking
no ai answers by defaultoptional off
query routed via our server
tracking params stripped from links
minimalist, link-only page
all five avoid behavioral tracking. 'optional off' means ai is on by default and removed via a setting.

The contenders

DuckDuckGo is the easy default: one switch, familiar results, no profile of you. Startpage serves Google's results without Google seeing who you are. Brave runs its own independent index, so it does not lean on Google or Bing at all. Mojeek is a genuinely independent crawler with a tiny, privacy-first footprint. Each one keeps no behavioral profile.

the honest part
On core privacy, all of these are solid choices. None builds a file on you. The real decision is about how the results page feels and how much gets stuffed onto it.

Where Bare fits

Bare is for people who find every other results page exhausting. No account, no history, no behavioral tracking, and no AI answer box standing between you and the link. Your query reaches the index through our server, so the index sees our network instead of your address, and no location signal travels with it.

It is not trying to do the most. It is trying to do the least: give you clean links and forget you the moment you leave. If that sounds like a relief rather than a limitation, Bare is the one to try.

How to actually switch

Pick one, set it as your browser's default search engine, and use it for a week. Switching costs nothing and reverses in seconds, so there is no risk in finding out which forgetful engine you like living with.