Search engine sizes: Fast All the Web finds most results

Greg Notess of Search Engine Showdown has now published a new more limited study of search engine sizes. On October 9 he compared Fast's newly enlarged database with Google, Alta Vista, Northern Light and iWon. iWon's advanced search represents the Inktomi GEN3 database, which is now also used by HotBot and NBCi.

Given 25 completely new single word queries, All the Web found more total hits than any other search engine. Google came in a close second, while iWon has moved into third place. Moreover, Northern Light is now larger than Alta Vista.

Google now claims that it has an index containing some 1.2 billion Web pages. In a comment made on the Search-L Search Engine Discussion List, Notess reports that he run a quick comparison of Google results after the Google announcement. He does not see any significant change compared to his study of October 9.

The reason that Google may report a larger index than Fast and still give fewer results, is that about half of the Google database is only partially indexes (represented by links from indexed pages).

• Search Engine Showdown statistics.
• Pandia on the new Fast index
• Pandia Post on the iWon search engine