Brave Search Uses Click Data In Search Ranking Algorithm

Oct 28, 2021 - 7:31 am 1 by

Brave Search

Brave made some big news the other week when it announced it is replacing Google Search as the default in its Brave browser with its own search engine. The thing is, Brave documented how it does ranking and it actually said it uses click data for ranking purposes.

Brave documented some of what it uses in its ranking algorithm, at a higher level. These include:

  • How closely search results match the search keywords (matching to exact words, parts of words, or synonyms)
  • How recent searches are for those keywords
  • How often a search result is clicked for a given keyword
  • How popular search keywords are
  • What pages are popular or novel
  • Which sites only allow crawling by the Google search bot

Direct Hit, a search engine pre-2000, used click data for ranking purposes. It didn't really last.

You can try out Brave Search over at search.brave.com.

I wonder how helpful click data is for a search engine like Brave?

Google has said for years and years it does not use click data because it finds it a poor metric for search.

Forum discussion at Twitter.

 

Popular Categories

The Pulse of the search community

Search Video Recaps

 
- YouTube
Video Details More Videos Subscribe to Videos

Most Recent Articles

Search Forum Recap

Daily Search Forum Recap: April 18, 2025

Apr 18, 2025 - 10:00 am
Search Video Recaps

Search News Buzz Video Recap: Google Ruled A Monopoly Again, Heated Volatility, Google ccTLD Change, Ads Safety Report & AI Overviews

Apr 18, 2025 - 8:01 am
Google

Google Made Search Much Faster - But How Much Faster?

Apr 18, 2025 - 7:51 am
Google Ads

New Google Merchant Center Popular Products Report

Apr 18, 2025 - 7:41 am
Google Search Engine Optimization

Google: No Positive SEO Effect From .esports Domain

Apr 18, 2025 - 7:31 am
Google Ads

Google Ads PMax Age Exclusions Rolling Out

Apr 18, 2025 - 7:21 am
Previous Story: Google Merchant Center Unique Product Identifier Limited Enforcement