How to set your default search engine to a dedicated no-AI domain (on Firefox)
I was initially disappointed when switching from Google to DuckDuckGo since it seemed the latter is just as filled with unavoidable AI slop, if not seemingly more so. (Since I previously had a Firefox extension to block all "AI overview" results from Google, which of course didn't work on DuckDuckGo, meaning I was now seeing even more stupid AI search results after the switch than before.)
Then I stumbled across this Bluesky post about DuckDuckGo's dedicated AI-free domain, noai.duckduckgo.com. I'd already switched my default search engine on Firefox to DuckDuckGo, but that post got me wondering if it was possible to replace my default search engine with THIS version of DuckDuckGo instead. Turns out, you can! On both desktop and mobile! So I wrote out a tutorial below if anyone wants to follow the same process.
Note: This no-AI domain might not catch everything, but it does eliminate a lot of the AI slop, which is a win in my book. According to the screenshot in the post: "The system relies on curated blocklists, including uBlockOrigin's Huge AI Blocklist, to detect and suppress Al-generated imagery." While this seems to indicate the site only blocks AI images, I haven't seen any "AI overview" text search results either since I started using it. Double win.
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1. In Firefox, open a new tab and look on the left side of the search bar. Click on the dropdown menu with "This time search with..." at the top and all the alternate search engines in the list below. I've already added NoAI DuckDuckGo, so you won't see that option yet; instead, click Search Settings at the very bottom.
2. (Alternatively, go straight to Firefox Search Settings by entering this in your web address bar: about:preferences#search)
3. Again, you won't find NoAI DuckDuckGo in the "Default Search Engine" box at the top...yet. You will have to add it first. Scroll all the way to the bottom where you will find the "Search Shortcuts" menu, and click "Add".
4. This is what I typed to add NoAI DuckDuckGo to my search engine list, which is the prerequisite step to making it the default search engine.
(Typed out below if you want to just copy and paste)
Search engine name: NoAI DuckDuckGo
URL with %s in place of search term: https://noai.duckduckgo.com/search?q=%s
Keyword (optional): @ noaiddg [remove space]
5. Now scroll to the top of the Search Settings page, where you will now be able to select "NoAI DuckDuckGo" from the dropdown menu of default search engine options!
6. Open a new tab and type in a search term to test. I searched "drawing references." It's still using the default DuckDuckGo logo on the left, but as you can see, the search info appearing below the search term is already pointing to the custom NoAI search engine we set.
7. And voila, it did indeed pull from noai.duckduckgo.com as the default search engine, not regular DuckDuckGo.
(I believe the "AI images: hide" toggle is in the basic DuckDuckGo search engine as well, but in the NoAI version, it's toggled off by default.)
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The process is even easier on mobile, especially if you copy and paste!
1. Go to the Firefox app, tap on the hamburger menu on the bottom right, and open "Settings"
2. Under "General," tap on "Search" (again, if you haven't manually added NoAI DuckDuckGo, you won't see that option yet)
3. Scroll down to "Alternative Search Engines" and tap "Add Search Engine"
4. Add the same info as you would for the desktop version, BUT look at the link carefully after you paste it, as on mine it added a random extra "25" at the end that I had to delete. Make sure the %s at the very end of the link stays intact, as it won't accept the search engine without it.
Again, here's the URL to copy and paste (make sure you get the whole link with %s at the end):
https://noai.duckduckgo.com/search?q=%s
5. Now scroll back up to "Default Search Engine," and you should see "NoAI DuckDuckGo" (or whatever you named yours when you added it) as an option you can select from the dropdown menu!
6. Again, you can test it in a new tab if you want, and it should pull your search results from the NoAI version of DuckDuckGo instead of the regular version.
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This tutorial was just for Firefox and the screenshots are both from Apple devices, but I'm guessing it's also possible to set a custom default search engine on other devices and browsers using a similar process.
Another thing to note: Even if you're signed in to the same Firefox account across multiple devices, and you keep them synced to use the same bookmarks and passwords etc., you will still have to set the default search engine individually on each device. The same thing applies to that other post going around about shutting off chatbots in Firefox using the about:config menu. You'll have to repeat the process on every device you use Firefox on.
