At the time of writing, the company claims to have planted 120,323,000 trees!Įcosia says 80% of its advertising profits are used to plant trees. Does Ecosia really plant trees when you search?Įcosia’s website says “Plant trees while you search the web”. It is the ad revenue that enables them to plant trees. Therefore if you use the search engine but don’t click on ads, Ecosia won’t make any money and therefore won't be planting any additional trees. The only way that Ecosia raises money is through clicks on advertisements. The adverts are generated by Bing, and when you click on one Ecosia receives a share of the revenue generated by the click (and the rest of the revenue generated from the click goes to Bing). Ad revenues from BingĮcosia’s revenue largely comes from Bing’s advertisements. In fact, at the end of 2020, Ecosia was said to have a 0.28% share of the search engine market in the UK. Unless it develops its own matrix to produce its own search results - an astonishingly enormous undertaking - then it will only ever constitute limited fringe competition to big players like Google and Bing. This approach to search is quite common - Yahoo and DuckDuckGo also have a ‘syndication agreement’ with Bing, meaning they pay for the right to use Bing’s technology. Ecosia doesn’t generate its own web results - instead it has a partnership with Bing, meaning that Bing provides both the results and advertisements that you see.Īs Ecosia doesn’t develop its own webpage results index, technologically speaking it’s not really a competitor in the world of search engines. When you search Ecosia you’re actually searching Microsoft Bing. If you have any experience with Ecosia or their services, please leave your reviews below.Ecosia, which bills itself as 'the search engine that plants trees', relies almost entirely on Microsoft Bing technology. Some of the most famous socially conscious companies include Toms, who donates a pair of shoes for every pair purchased, and Warby Parker, who donates glasses to children in need. There are many different options for people looking to work with for-profit companies that still work to benefit society and the environment, though they may not be in the area of internet searches. However, there are people online complaining that they are unsure of whether or not this company actually fulfills their promises to users.Į does say that they are a certified B Corporation, which is a special certification given to for-profit organizations that also work to “meet rigorous standards of social and environmental performance, accountability, and transparency.” See Also: Is Corporate Philanthropy Real or Are "Socially Conscious" Companies a Scam? Refund Policyīecause this company does not charge their customers any money to download their browser extension nor do they charge any fees to perform searches with their extension, so they do not offer their customers a Refund Policy.Ĭustomers who would like to contact Customer Service with any questions, concerns, or complaints can do so by email at Ecosia ReputationĪs a free web browser extension, this product doesn’t seem to drive a lot of reviews. Instead, the charitable fees paid to this company all come from the advertisements that you will be exposed to on this search platform, as opposed to traditional search engines who are described as keeping advertising profits for themselves. This counter does not intend to show you how many trees you have personally planted all on your own, but rather how many trees that you have financially contributed toward planting.Īs an optional browser extension, this company does not charge their customers any fees to download their product or to use it when they are performing searches. When you perform your Ecosia search they will display a personalized tree counter for you, which will help you understand how many trees you have already helped to plant. Their website says that the funds generated by Ecosia has helped them to plant an average of one tree every 30 seconds.
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