Over the years many search engines have tried and failed to fight Google for industry supremacy, but early statistics appeared that Microsoft may have fired the first shot over the bow of the mighty Google with its release of Bing – although the attack appears to have been short lived.
According to statistics from StatCounter, Bing quickly became the second most popular search engine in the U.S. the day following its official release. The website reports that on Wednesday June 3, Bing was in third place with 8.4 percent of searches while Yahoo held the number two spot with 11.28 percent.
However, by Friday those statistics were flipped with Bing jumping to 15.64 percent and Yahoo holding at 10.32 percent. The big surprise in these numbers could be that Google – although still by and far the industry leader – appears to have taken the biggest hit, falling from 78.07 percent to 71.99 percent.
"It remains to be seen if Bing falls away after the initial novelty and promotion but at first sight it looks like Microsoft is on to a winner," said StatCounter CEO Aodhan Cullen last week.
And it would appear that the early bounce did not hold with the following days showing Yahoo regaining the runner-up spot. By Sunday Bing had fallen back down to 5.61 percent while Yahoo maintained 11.34 percent of the market. Meanwhile, Google regained its pace and held 80.52 percent of searches, according to StatCounter.
