Yes, I hate Google—that's a fact. But consider this a personal boycott; I wasn't influenced by anyone or any specific event. I genuinely don't like any product developed under Alphabet. Seeing this as mere hate would be superficial because I have valid reasons to dislike them, and I believe I have a good grasp of certain Google technologies. If you're new to tech, they might try to hypnotize you with their open-source support and developer-friendly approach, but anyone familiar with the topic knows that Google is the biggest monopoly and the most dictatorial company among FAANG (even more than Meta).

Google Search Engine

The experience is designed to keep you within Google rather than finding what you're looking for. If you're doing real research, Google will never show you what you want. There are 3 main reasons for this. I mentioned the first one - Google wants you to stay within their ecosystem. The other two reasons are their advertising network and heavy censorship due to political reasons. I don't want to dive deep into political analysis in this write-up, but Google has never been a company that values freedom of thought. Generally speaking, using Google as a search engine in 2024 is one of the worst user experiences you can have.

Alternatives

• Ecosia: Using Google's infrastructure but claims no user tracking. They make money through search-based monetization.
• Startpage: Works almost identical to Ecosia.
• Kagi Search: Paid but generally a satisfying solution. The lens feature is quite useful.
• Brave Search: Does anonymous metric tracking but can be turned off in settings. Kind of annoying that this setting is on by default.
• DuckDuckGo: Shows Bing results but I can't say I easily find what I'm looking for. Didn't give me a great experience.

Chrome

I look for certain features in a browser: user-friendly interface, speed, privacy, and security. I also care about stability and extension support. Chrome meets most requirements except privacy and freedom, but due to its massive resource consumption (an engineering disaster), it doesn't allow for effective use. Privacy-wise, it's a complete disaster like every Google product - basically, a spy hub working for Google. Sadly, I still use Chrome because of my workplace and some Google Workspace tools not working properly in other browsers.

Alternatives

• Ungoogled Chromium: Vanilla Chrome stripped of Google services. The lack of (direct) synchronization and complicated extension installation is a minus, but I'm planning to find a solution and switch to it.
• Brave: Conceptually successful but has too many bloatware parts. Direct Tor network connection feature is a nice plus.
• Firefox: Stock Firefox is generally slow and contains Mozilla telemetry.

Firefox-based browsers:

• LibreWolf: A browser I find valuable for privacy, but I find vanilla Firefox UI quite outdated.
• Floorp: Nice to be able to disable Mozilla telemetry. Fingerprinting protection and, the ability to disable features like WebGL and WebRTC are quite successful. I liked its speed from what I experienced.
• Zen Browser: I generally like Zen, mod store part is quite good, but vertical tabs are something I'll never get used to, and as long as it doesn't allow horizontal tabs because I don't like my screen getting narrower, I won't consider switching.

Why Safari isn't on the List?

Safari might be the least resource-consuming and fastest browser I've seen. Its optimization for the operating system and Apple engineering plays a big part in this. So why don't I ditch everything and switch to Safari? Because I just can't get used to the interface, and extension support is insufficient. Also, installing extensions like apps isn't the best practice in my opinion.

Gmail

Gmail generally works stable, but too many embedded ads and the same distrust and privacy issues with Google as in other products remind me that I need to leave Gmail. Breaking away from Gmail isn't that hard. (excluding the Google sign-in part)

Alternatives

• ProtonMail: E2EE is a big plus, but limited storage and reports that they share some data with governments drove me away from ProtonMail.
• iCloud: If you're in the Apple ecosystem, iCloud is the best solution. However, if you want to easily sign in to websites and apps, you'll find it's not as widely used as Google.
• Self-hosted mail server (Mailcow, Zimbra, etc.): Generally the best solution. If you're a tech enthusiast or interested in technology, I recommend setting up your server. Since I'm considering this solution for my company, I'm thinking of proceeding with it.

Google Workspace

The startup I work for uses Google Workspace, and this might be the thing that ties me to Google the most after YouTube. Google's office programs work well, and Drive service is relatively cheap. Generally looking at it, it seems like a cheap and ideal system, but here privacy comes into play again. This is important for a commercial system—it's not smart to leave a profit-generating system in Google's hands.

Alternatives

The first Google Workspace alternative that comes to mind is Nextcloud. You can host it on your server, and it's open-source. If you don't want to use a specific collaboration program, you can combine solutions that suit you to create your package ¯_(ツ)_/¯

Google Photos

Google processes your photos. Additionally, your chance of protection against data leaks is low. Plus, since you use your Google Photos account on many websites, your risk of being hacked is much higher. Storage is insufficient in the free version, and generally speaking, I can easily say I don't like Google Photos.

Alternatives

• Ente Photos: For a regular user, setting up a system to host photos on their server might be a bit confusing and challenging. Ente Photos stores your photos in three different locations (I think for Europe) with a subscription and encrypts with E2EE. It also has ML features like face recognition, which can be found in Google Photos.
• Immich: Immich has all the features of Google Photos, but you have to host it on your server. If you're planning to do this, Immich is the best option.
• iCloud: If you're someone like me who benefits from the Apple ecosystem, iCloud might be the best option. However, the free version definitely won't be enough. You can store your photos and videos for a small monthly fee. With iOS 18 and macOS Sequoia, Apple Photos has been renewed and offers many lifesaving features.

Google DNS

Actually, I've only used Google's DNS server for a few weeks total in my life. If anyone's still using it, I'll offer some alternatives. As for Google DNS's problem, of course, the biggest issue is privacy and security. I also don't remember it providing very good performance, but maybe its current version is satisfactory.

Alternatives

• AdGuard: It's nice that it blocks Google and other ad services, but when it also blocks some special services tied to Google's ad network, it provides a bad experience. Since it's not possible to whitelist these addresses through DNS (as far as I know), it's not my preferred DNS provider. I'm thinking of sharing a post about ad blocking too. It'll be about a Pi-hole-like tunnel installed on a home server. Stay tuned! :)
• Cloudflare: I'm currently using Cloudflare; it's satisfying in terms of speed, and there are no restrictions. I prefer Cloudflare because there's constant bandwidth throttling and blocking in my region. I'm sure it's not the best option for privacy, but it seems like the most ideal option in a real usage scenario.
• NextDNS: A good option for privacy and security, but it has limitations in the free version.

Password Manager & Authentication

The biggest vulnerability might arise in the Google Password Manager part because when your Google account is stolen (which is very likely), you're serving your other passwords to hackers on a golden platter. I use a password manager because of Chrome, but I'm gradually switching to Apple Passwords. I'm not sure if I'll keep using Apple Passwords; I might also proceed with an open-source solution. What's important for me here is privacy, security, and autofill that works properly with the browser I use.

The authentication part is probably, along with YouTube, the area where I'll have the hardest time finding alternatives. Being able to sign up and sign in to sites with one click using your Google account makes life easier. I'm thinking of overcoming this by setting up a good autofill system that will make it easier for me to log in with email. I'll register and log in to sites with my email address, but it will generate a password for me and immediately save the email and password to my password manager.

Alternatives

Password Manager:

• Bitwarden: Open-source, E2EE, and one of the most popular options. Browser and mobile integration is pretty good. I guess this is the most ideal password manager solution for me.
• Apple Passwords: Currently using it along with Google. It works integrated with Chrome, but I can't say it always works well. It seems like a temporary solution (at least for me).
• KeePassXC: You can keep your passwords locally on your devices, and it also has an extension for browsers. The biggest problem here is cross-device synchronization, but you can overcome this using Syncthing.

Authentication:

• Ente Auth: I'm currently using this. Being E2EE and open-source is a requirement, and Ente provides this for you.

Maps

Well, I guess Google Maps might be the thing people will have the hardest time finding alternatives for. In the country where I live, due to Google's agreement with the government (or maybe disagreement), the satellite view is completely censored, and this is very annoying. I can't say it's successful in terms of navigation. Yandex provides more accurate results for Türkiye.

Alternatives

• OpenStreetMap: OpenStreetMap is a provider. For an up-to-date experience, you can use community-developed and grown solutions based on OpenStreetMap (like Organic Maps).
• Apple Maps: Apple Maps isn't as insufficient as it used to be, but if you're outside the US, I can't say it's very usable daily.

YouTube

YouTube is the only Google product I can't give up (you can tell this from the fact that it wasn't created by Google 😄). It has no real alternative; it's truly a monopoly in this regard.

YouTube Alternatives

• PeerTube: You can host it on your server, and all PeerTube servers connect to create a common pool. It's kind of similar to torrenting in this aspect. However, setting up and maintaining a video server can be a bit tiring.
• Odysee: A blockchain-based platform and a better alternative compared to PeerTube.

Alternative YouTube Clients

I guess Invidious is what I like best here. It's an open-source YouTube front-end, and you can also host it on your server. I don't have many recommendations on the mobile side because I only watch YouTube from my computer.

Android

I could talk for hours about Android's problems, but that's not the topic of this post. I'll explain why Android is bad in one paragraph.

Leaving aside the fact that it's way below average in terms of privacy and security, I'll focus on the poor user experience. Android isn't a stable and functional operating system because it's developed from a single point for too many devices, and mobile device manufacturers try to integrate it according to their hardware. This is not an ideal situation and leads to many conflicts. There's a similar problem for app developers; they try to develop apps for too many different hardware configurations and end up producing low-quality products. As a result of these disagreements, you can't build an ecosystem that works well with Android. And when you have a giant like Apple on the other side, you remain just an economic alternative.

Alternatives

• De-Googled Android ROMs: You can prefer ROMs stripped of Google services or use with Micro-G. In that case, my preference would be LineageOS. If you don't use mobile devices much, you can have a device that just performs basic functions and isn't tracked by Google.
• iOS and iPhone: If you want a real operating system and a working device, your only option is iOS and iPhone. As an iOS developer, of course, I won't be able to be very objective, and even if I were objective, it's a fact that iOS is unrivaled. Contrary to general belief, there aren't any general restrictions that end users will be exposed to. If we're going to talk about iOS not being open-source, if you're not developing your operating system through the open-source Android project, you don't have the right to discuss this. The iPhone doesn't just offer hardware or software; it offers an experience as a whole. This is exactly the part that Google needs to take as an example.

I hope you haven't forgotten that this post reflects my personal experiences and the decisions made as a result. It's not possible to ensure the privacy and security that I constantly emphasize throughout the post completely. If you're on the internet, you can't claim you're 100% safe in any way. Anyone who sells this to you is lying. I'll publish a post about this as soon as possible as well. However, you can take necessary precautions to minimize the possibility of data leaks and your data being scattered around. Unfortunately, there's no black and white in that situation. I hope this post has been helpful to you and has sparked some ideas. Peace out!