De-Googling? Here are my recommendations for alternatives
Quite rightly, questions are being asked about the power of US-owned “big tech”, and particularly Google, which seems to be in control of rather a lot of our lives. If you get removed from Google’s index, very few people could see your stuff - since Google has a virtual monopoly on web searching in many places.
I was a fan of Google’s stuff back in the early 2000s - a fan enough to get a picture in front of the sign - but the company seems to have lost its way recently. Not least - the company hasn’t really launched anything new for the past ten years; it’s been playing catch-up ever since.
If you’d like to de-Google yourself, then here are a few alternatives I’ve discovered - but also, a dim realisation that Google still has a lot of access to my life.
Search Engine: Kagi
Kagi. I’ve written a long piece about Kagi, but it’s a paid-for search engine that doesn’t have any advertising in it, nor any AI (unless you want AI, in which case just end the query with a question-mark). I’ve been a happy user of it for the last two and a half years, and I’d recommend it.
Browser: Helium
Helium. Again, I’ve written a long piece about the search for an alternative browser, all the options out there, and the one I finally chose. Helium is private, includes ad-blocking, and is a pared-down browser without anything you don’t need, like password managers or an email client.
Passwords: Bitwarden
It’s easy to rely on Google’s password manager. I did for many years. But it hooks you into Chrome and Android, and a more multiplatform tool is the right thing. I use Bitwarden, including using it to store TOTP tokens and passkeys. Bitwarden is very cheap and is pretty good, even if some changes in management recently have made me a little more nervous about it.
Phone: iPhone
I used to have an Android device - indeed, I had one from 2010 up until 2024. But the amount of data Google sucked from the Android ecosystem was rather too much for me; and, as I wrote at the time, the chaos of the Android ecosystem was fun, but the dependability and privacy of Apple was rather better.
Email: forwardemail
ForwardEmail. I’ve not de-Googled my email: it still goes into a Gmail account. This is partially laziness, and partially that all my email (and I mean, all my email) is in Gmail in some way; and that Mimestream is the best email client I’ve ever used. But, ForwardEmail - geeky and unaccessible as it might be - now also has a very nice web client (and app), and is a very good and competent email service. I use it to forward email, and will one day use it to host email too. You should take a look at it.
Maps
There’s no obvious replacement for Google Maps.
I’d recommend the free CoMaps, an app that uses OpenStreetMaps data, and is updated regularly. It has an Apple CarPlay view as well. But, realistically, search is still poor, and it’s not got any traffic information or other tools.
I am currently using Waze, which is still Google (but not Google Maps and, as far as I can see, not actually connected to my Google account). Waze does one thing for me that Apple Maps doesn’t - it can be set to make an irritating chirpy noise if I go over the speed limit.
Otherwise, Apple Maps is fine in the car, and looks quite pretty.
Storage
I’m with both Dropbox and Google Drive. For Dropbox, it’s because I’ve amassed 69GB in free storage somehow, which is enough for the use I put it to; for Google Drive, it’s because I’m still paying for a Google Workspace account, and should, at least, use it for something. But, if I were de-Googling, I think the way I’d do online storage these days is to use Syncthing (which copies files between computers); to use Tailscale to connect into my network; and to run an offsite back it up to Amazon S3 deep storage for redundancy.
Photos
Every single photo I’ve ever taken is in Google Photos. At some stage it would be nice to move away from them. I think I’d probably self-host using something like Immich, but backup everything to Amazon S3. I feel no particular urgency here, though.
Home automation/security
I have a number of Google cameras - they were relatively cheap and do the right kind of thing. But, I’m not getting anything else from Google in terms of smart home devices (not sure thy’re even making any), and have a new strategy to only use Matter devices. IKEA has lots of those at very low prices.
I’ve hooked my Google cameras into Home Assistant via a rather torturous process; so don’t need the Google Home app for much other than configuration. The Google speakers we have are still (mostly) working, but get very little use these days, so I suspect I’ll just remove them at some stage. Eventually, all that will be removed at some point - but only when there are Matter-compatible devices.
TV Streamer
The main TV streamer in the house is a Google one (connected to a family account). At some point, I think I might switch to an Apple TV box, but I’m waiting for a hardware refresh before I do that. I’d hope that all the apps and services we use would be available, so I guess I should be checking for that when a new piece of hardware is eventually available.
Wifi
Yes, I’ve even got Google wifi - the original ones from Google (I’ve bought a few second-hand on eBay to add to the mesh within the house). It is possible to de-Google the hardware by putting OpenWRT on them but that isn’t particularly easy, and involves opening each device to press buttons on the circuit-board. Right now, the wifi works (after ten years), and I’m happy to just leave it until it fails.
In conclusion
Google has quite the tentacles into this house; and the answer to many of them is “Apple”, which is fine, but doesn’t really escape US Big Tech.