Google responds to the decline in search traffic on Apple devices: still seeing continuous growth in total search queries
Google paints a starkly different picture of search trends: we continue to see sustained growth in total search queries, including an increase in queries from Apple devices and platforms. More generally, as we add new features to the search engine, people find Google Search more helpful for a wider range of questions—they access search in new ways and contexts through browsers or the Google app, using voice or Google Lens. We are excited about such innovations and look forward to sharing more at the Google I/O conference
Google issued a statement late Wednesday local time in response to media reports about a decline in search traffic on Apple devices.
Earlier on Wednesday during the U.S. stock trading session, Apple’s Senior Vice President Eddy Cue testified in the antitrust lawsuit filed by the U.S. Department of Justice against Google’s parent company Alphabet, revealing for the first time that Google search traffic on Apple devices has decreased.
However, Google painted a starkly different picture regarding search trends:
Here is our statement regarding the news reports about search traffic this morning
We continue to see sustained growth in total search queries, including an increase in queries from Apple devices and platforms. More generally, as we add new features to our search engine, people are finding Google Search more helpful for a wider range of questions—they access search in new ways and contexts through browsers or the Google app, using voice or Google Lens. We are excited about such innovations and look forward to sharing more at the Google I/O conference.
Apple receives about $20 billion annually from Google in exchange for setting Google as the default search engine on its devices. However, Eddy Cue pointed out that the entire search landscape is undergoing fundamental changes in the era of artificial intelligence. Eddy Cue stated that Apple plans to integrate its Safari browser with AI chatbots, such as OpenAI's ChatGPT, Perplexity AI, and/or Anthropic's Claude.
The market is concerned that this decision may end the long-standing partnership between Apple and Google, triggering significant changes across the industry and posing a severe challenge to Google's dominance in the search field. The era of Google-dominated search may be coming to an end.
On Wednesday, Google’s stock experienced a rare drop of over 9% at one point during trading, closing down nearly 7.3%. Google’s statement was also released shortly after its stock price plummeted.
On Thursday morning in the U.S. stock market, Google’s stock regained some of the losses from the previous day, rising over 2% during trading.
The chart below shows Google’s performance over the past two days:
