What is Bing?

Created and operated by Microsoft, Bing is a search engine that people may use instead of Google or Yahoo. It provides users with many different search services, including but not limited to web, video, image, and online maps.

Bing has its origins in Microsoft's previous search engines, such as Windows Live Search, MSN Search, and Live Search. But over time, it has created a significant name for itself in the digital space. While it may not be as commonly used as Google, some people still prefer it over other search engines due to its expanding grasp of multimedia content. 

What’s more, it’s the second-largest search engine by market share in the US and happens to be one of the 50 most visited sites on the web, according to Alexa rankings.

So, let’s discuss what makes Bing special and why some users prefer it over Google or other search engines.

How Bing Works

For the most part, Bing works the same way as most other search engines: You type in a query and it returns pages of results sorted according to Bing’s ranking algorithm. Key factors for how well pages ranks include: 

• The age of a page
• Keywords in a piece of content and the number of times they’ve been repeated
• The number of other high-authority sites that have linked to the page that the content is on

Apart from this, other elements come into play too. For instance, the extent to which you’ve included specific related search terms on your page, especially in the title tag (and places like the meta description), also matters. In other words, even if your page has a high number of backlinks from other relevant pages, it will only rank high in search results if your site has relevance too.

Moreover, search engines like Google and Bing have become progressively refined over the years.  What was initially laid out as a relatively simple ranking system has advanced into an intricate framework incorporating image identification, social media, artificial intelligence, and an entire host of other individual factors.

Is Bing Better Than Google?

For most of us, the term “search engine” immediately makes us think of Google, but Bing offers some unique features in ranking algorithms that are notable. While search engine optimization is still significant, Bing places less priority on backlinks and more on pages that have been around for longer periods. 

In some studies, Bing's results were even proven to be superior to Google's. But only in certain aspects, of course.

That aside, another thing that sets Bing aside is that it doesn’t “crawl” through pages the way Google does. In other words, it focuses on ranking only a fraction of the search material, and lets links do the rest. 

The area where Bings arguably outshines Google is in its ability to scour through multimedia in digital spaces. Bing’s algorithm can read and understand a lot of visual content such as videos and images, which means that it can often provide great matches to the media content you are searching for. While Google has improved on this over time, too, you’ll notice that its search results are still quite limited when it comes to images and other visual communications. 

Key Takeaway

Bing is a legitimate alternative to search engines like Google and offers certain advantages. If you’ve been looking for a new search engine for your browser, you may want to try out Bing and see if it suits your needs!