Upfront Summary: Ecosia is not a scam. It is a legit platform for browsing. One of the ways you know a scam is that they do not do what they say they will do. Ecosia has kept its word by doing everything it said would. They neither sell your data nor mislead their users. The company enjoys numerous positive reviews across various review sites.

Ecosia is a Berlin-based search engine that claims it uses the ad revenue from your searches to plant trees where they are most needed. Based on the report published by Ecosia, they have planted more than 159 million trees. Also, they have had a track record of not misleading people who use their search engine. Keep reading to find out more about this exciting search engine.

Ecosia Homepage
Source: Ecosia.org

Table of Contents

  1. Ecosia Company Information Table
  2. What is Ecosia?
  3. Is Ecosia Safe and Legit?
  4. Is Ecosia Reliable and Trustworthy?
  5. Pros of Ecosia
  6. Cons of Ecosia
  7. How Does Ecosia Make Money?
  8. Best Ecosia Alternatives
  9. FAQs

Ecosia Company Information Table

Official Website:https://www.ecosia.org/?c=en
Founded:2009
Founder:Christian Kroll
LocationBerlin, Germany.
Contact:hello@ecosia.org https://ecosia.helpscoutdocs.com/article/364-contact-us#
Social MediaTwitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, and YouTube.
Ecosia Company Information Table

What is Ecosia?

Ecosia is a not-for-profit search engine that plants trees using the revenue from advertising. The search engine neither has Google search results nor DuckDuckGo privacy focus. The mission of Ecosia is unique: Ecosia prides itself on planting trees, not collecting user data to sell them, giving people the right search results, and not using its browser extension to monitor your data, among others.

The speed at which Ecosia is getting recognized and accepted among search engine users is impressive. An excellent example worthy of note is this; Ecosia will be one of those search engines you can set as default in Safari, starting from Apple’s iOS 14 and iPad 14. It is also part of the inbuilt options that Google Chrome will include in these devices.

Ecosia aims to make the environment better through tree planting. As much as possible, Ecosia wants to use tree planting to absorb as much CO2 as possible. The mission to plant trees and CO2 absorption will positively influence the change in our climate. This positive change will benefit animals and humans on our planet, and ultimately, the planet at large.

Ecosia agrees that tree planting can aid empowerment and alleviate a lot of people from poverty. Ecosia believes that it can be done by regenerating depleted soils and by programs like agroforestry food growth. Ecosia is also concerned that animals worldwide are losing their natural habitat through deforestation, and Ecosia wants to restore the habitats of animals through tree planting.

Is Ecosia Safe and Legit?

Is Ecosia Secure?

Ecosia is a safe and secure site, so you do not need to worry. Ecosia will not sell your personal information to third parties, and Ecosia will not introduce any virus or malware to your system. You can never go wrong with Ecosia, as it has had an outstanding track record since its inception.

Does Ecosia Steal Your Data?

The very short answer is NO! Ecosia will never steal your data, and Ecosia will never sell any of the data they collected from you to any third party.

Can Ecosia Give You A Virus?

It is not out of place to see a lot of websites on the internet telling you that Ecosia is malware and a virus. They say many things about Ecosia, calling the search engine a browser hijacker and spyware. These rumors are unfounded, as the Ecosia browser extension will not, in any way, cause harm to your computer.

Is Ecosia Certified?

When you hear Ecosia, what should come to your mind is Impact Over profit. In 2009 when Ecosia was founded, the search engine promised users of Impact over profit, and Ecosia has since then kept to its word. Officially, B Lab recognizes Ecosia as a Certified B Corp.

Is Ecosia Reliable and Trustworthy?

Ecosia Web Rating

Ecosia has an overall web rating of 4 stars. This rating is not a bad one. Ecosia aims to give users a search engine with both a sleek and intuitive experience: a much better experience than that of the search engine’s top competitors. The company has a 4.5/5 stars rating on Producthunt.com and a 4.1/5 stars rating on TrustPilot.

Does Ecosia Have a Refund Policy?

No. Ecosia is a free search engine, and as such, you are not paying anything to use its services. No payment means no need for refunds. However, Ecosia has a Shop offering called EcosiaShop, where you can buy items. It also has a Tree Shop. Both the Tree Shop and the EcosiaShop have a 30-day refund policy.

Pros of Ecosia

Ecosia Pros
Source: Ecosia.org
  • Ecosia offers fast and relevant search results.
  • Ecosia uses a significant part of its revenue for tree planting globally.
  • The browser extension of Ecosia is sleek.
  • Ecosia places emphasis on secure searches and the privacy of users.

Cons of Ecosia

  • Ecosia partners with Bing, and it may put some user data at risk.
  • Ecosia ensures that users download all their different extensions.
  • It shows limited images in search outcomes.
  • Sometimes, the search results aren’t very relevant to the search query

How Does Ecosia Make Money?

There are two basic ways Ecosia makes money, they are;

  • EcoAds
  • EcoLinks

Ecosia makes money the same way Google does. They make money when users click advertisements above or beside the search results. For every click on ads, a few cents is earned. The ad can either be delivered by Bing (their primary partner) or through a portion of the purchased price fixed via an affiliate link.

In addition to ads, Ecosia has a feature called Ecosia Travel. Ecosia Travel is a feature that Ecosia uses to raise money for planting 25 trees for every hotel booking done through them. A small amount of the commission is from the sale of things from their online store. For every T-shirt that Ecosia sells, they plant 20 new trees.

Best Ecosia Alternatives

Ecosia has all these good features and intentions to make the world a better place, but there are other search engines that can give you the best search results. Though they may not have the mission of Ecosia, the following can be excellent Ecosia alternatives:

  • YaCy
  • MetaGer
  • DeeperWeb
  • AOL
  • Ask.com
  • WolframAlpha
  • Baidu
  • Dogpile
  • Yahoo
  • Yandex
  • Bing
  • CC Search
  • Search Encrypt
  • GiveWater
  • Neeva
  • Google

Frequently Asked Questions

Does Ecosia Have A Blog?

Ecosia has a very active blog. To access the Ecosia blog, click here. The search engine blog is not only available in English; It is also available in German and French languages. For the German version of the blog, click here; for the French version of the blog, click here.

What are The Advantages of Advertising on Ecosia? 

One of the planet-positive marketing activities you can do as an advertiser is to spend some percentage of your ads on Ecosia. All the profits that Ecosia makes go back to climate action: 80% of this profit is used for tree planting, and the remaining 20% goes into green investments, such as solar farms.

Currently, Ecosia records over 20 million active users monthly. This is the largest number of people coming together to cause a positive climate change. The audience of Ecosia is unique. Although Ecosia may be younger than some of the alternatives in this article, it has very motivated users. The users are into ethical businesses and are purpose-driven.

What is Ecosia Travel?

Ecosia partners with many hotels to provide travelers with a very rich hotel experience. This feature is integrated into Ecosia search too. You can access this feature by just typing ‘hotel’ in the search bar. This feature is one of the features that Ecosia uses to make money. For every hotel booking done through Ecosia, 25 trees are planted. You can add to the positive climate change by booking a hotel for your next trip here.

You can find Ecosia Travel in countries like the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Sweden, Spain, Italy, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, Netherlands, and the United States. Ecosia has a goal, and it is to bring this rich hotel experience to traveling users around the world.

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