Summary of "Kagi Search: 3 Months Later - News, Features & Why I'm Staying"

Overview

Personal review after roughly three months of daily use (switched from Google). The reviewer prefers Kagi’s results and is staying with the product. Kagi is a paid search engine with incentives different from ad-driven Google.

The reviewer prefers Kagi’s results and is staying on the product.

Key product features and behavior

Paid tiers
- Starter: 300 searches/month.
- Professional: unlimited searches. (Reviewer uses Professional because their usage is >1,000 searches/month.)
No ads by default — ranking incentives focus on user satisfaction rather than ad clicks.
Image search: easier to download full images with fewer redirects compared to Google.
Promote/demote/report UI on results: users can upvote or downvote sites and report AI-generated or low-quality results (referred to as reporting “AI slop”).
Kagi Assistant: integrated assistant/chat. Ending a query with a question mark returns a quick AI-generated answer (this consumes monthly AI token allotment).
Kagi Small / “Small Web”: a curated listing that surfaces smaller personal blogs and non-generic sites.
Kagi News: a new daily-updated news service (one daily update intended to discourage doomscrolling); appears US-focused according to the reviewer.
Kagi Translate: built-in translation service (reviewer hasn’t heavily used it but reports say it compares well to Google Translate).
Orion browser: a new browser from the Kagi team (Mac, iPhone, iPad only; WebKit-based). The reviewer is skeptical and would have preferred Gecko or an open-source option.
Kagi Hub (Belgrade): company office where members can reserve a desk to work alongside employees.
Kagi Store / merch: company-run t-shirt production; some community criticism about spending priorities.
Analytics: public stats show growing query and membership counts; community endorsements are visible on Lobsters and Hacker News.

Pros (as called out by the reviewer)

High-quality search results — reviewer sees no need to check Google for the same queries.
Better incentive alignment because users pay (less ad bias).
Tools to surface small websites and provide feedback on result quality.
Active experimentation by a small startup — frequent feature rollouts.

Cons / caveats mentioned

Paid service — cost may be a barrier for casual users; the Starter plan’s 300-search cap is limiting for power users.
Some experiments may feel unfocused; there is community critique.
Orion is platform-limited and not open source.
Kagi News seems US-centric and may have limited value for non-US users.

Practical tips / guide points from the video

If you search a lot, choose the Professional (unlimited) tier.
Append a question mark to a search to trigger the Kagi Assistant quick-answer (this uses AI tokens).
Use the promote/demote/report controls to surface better sources and to report AI-generated or poor results.
Explore Kagi Small to discover personal blogs and niche sites.