Search & quick answers
Ofcom found 75% of UK online adults read AI search summaries at least sometimes, mostly because Google now puts them above the links. The tools here differ less in how clever the answers are than in who pays for them, with ads, subscriptions or both, and in what happens to the questions afterwards. AI news readers such as Ground News and Particle sit in the alternatives because chatbot news use in the UK is still small.
Updated monthly.
Kenning's picks
Ranked by Kenning score out of 25. Tools scoring 12 or less are marked not recommended.
Brave Search (Ask Brave and Leo)
Brave Search runs on its own index rather than Google's or Bing's and tops about a third of results with an AI summary that cites sources. Ask Brave chats are deleted after 24 hours of inactivity and are not used for training, and the AI can be switched off with one setting. Users say the Leo assistant still drifts off topic, and the AI features keep reappearing for people who have tried to turn them off.
Best for Private everyday searching with an optional AI summary
Google Search AI Mode
AI Mode sits one tap away in the Google search box and the Google app, costs nothing, and Google says it passed one billion monthly users in May 2026. Testers like it for messy multi-part questions but have caught it inventing a research paper and repeating a maker's marketing as advice. Searches and AI answers are used to train Google's models unless Search history is switched off.
Best for Planning and comparison questions from people who already use Google
Duck.ai (DuckDuckGo)
Duck.ai lets anyone ask GPT, Claude, Mistral and other models questions with no sign-up, and DuckDuckGo strips the IP address before anything reaches them. The providers promise not to train on chats and to delete them within 30 days, though a June 2026 user thread argued that promise is hard to check. There is no memory between chats, no image generation and no deep research, so it suits quick private questions more than big projects.
Best for Quick private questions without making an account
Perplexity
Perplexity answers questions with numbered links to its sources, so checking a claim takes one tap. PCMag rates it the best AI search tool it has tested, though testers still catch confident wrong answers. Pro costs £20 a month in the UK, and paying users in user reviews complain about new credit limits and constant upsells.
Best for Questions where the source matters as much as the answer
Kagi
Kagi charges $5 a month for 300 searches or $10 for unlimited, and in return shows no ads and lets members block or boost whole websites. John Gruber and XDA rate its results above Google's, and AI answers only appear when asked for, with Assistant chats deleted after a day. It has about 75,600 paying members and small app-store footprints, so most people will meet it only if they go looking.
Best for Heavy searchers fed up with ads and willing to pay
More tools
Arc Search
An AI-enabled mobile browser whose 'Browse for me' feature reads several pages and condenses them into one summary.
Brief
Daily email and website that condenses many news articles on chosen topics into short stories with several angles.
Consensus
Search engine that answers questions from published scientific papers and shows which studies agree.
Ecosia
A search engine that says it spends all its profits on climate projects, with over 250 million trees planted.
Felo
AI search engine that answers questions with sources, searching in other languages and translating the results.
Ground News
A news app that compares how outlets across the political spectrum cover each story, with short AI summaries.
Microsoft Bing (Copilot Search)
Microsoft's search engine, which now puts Copilot-written answers with citations above the links.
Particle
An AI news reader that merges many outlets' coverage of a story into short summaries, including an 'Opposite Sides' view.
Perplexity Computer
Perplexity's agent system that splits long tasks across many AI models and works through them for users
Perplexity Model Council
A Perplexity Max mode that asks three AI models the same question and merges their answers into one
Perplexity Personal Computer
Mac version of Perplexity Computer that works across local files, native apps and the browser
Perplexity Portable Computer
Local version of Perplexity's Computer agent that runs on Nvidia hardware and keeps files on the machine
Qwant
A private search engine that pitches itself as valuing people 'as a user, not as a product'.
Startpage
A private search engine app that says it deletes personal data and IP addresses with every search.
SynthID Detector
Google's checker for hidden watermarks that show an image, video or audio clip was made or edited with AI.
Yelp Assistant
Chat assistant inside the Yelp app that answers questions about local businesses and can book or order.