Recently released statistics by internet research firm Compete, indicate that Google is still convincingly number one and this doesn’t look like changing anytime soon.

Market share numbers for the top five search engines on the Web for US traffic for January 2007, December 2007, and January 2008 show that Google is continuing to increase its dominance in search over Yahoo! and Microsoft.

Google gained half a percent in market share in January, whilst both Yahoo! and Microsoft’s market share decreased.

Since the beginning of 2007, Yahoo!’s market share has diminished by 6%. This is a significant statistic considering the Yahoo! board believe the $44.6 billion bid by Microsoft “undervalues” the company.

Microsoft’s claim on the market has remained largely unchanged. In January 2007, the company saw itself commanding an 8.9% slice, which grew to 9.1% later in the year, only to fall 0.4% over the first few weeks of 2008.

It is good to see that Ask’s market share has grown consistently over this period, although their share is still miniscule compared to Google.

The questions remains “is anyone going to ever topple Google?” Perhaps the combined forces of Yahoo! and Microsoft might – assuming the merger goes ahead.

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