Startpage sustainability score: 26/100
Startpage is a privacy-focused search engine based in the Netherlands, operated by Surfboard Holding B.V. It says it handles about two billion searches a year.
More about Startpage
The company sources search results from Google, news from Microsoft Bing, and ad revenue from contextual advertising platforms. It remains privately held with no published financial or headcount data.
Head office NetherlandsStaff Not publishedRevenue Not publishedWebsite ↗
Startpage publishes virtually no environmental data. It claims green servers but Green Web Foundation finds no evidence. No emissions targets, no supplier Scope 3 accounting, no sustainability report. The company discloses one 2021 blog post; everything else is silence. Environmental governance is absent.
Startpage scores 26/100 (Significant gaps) on SINK's independent climate assessment, scored from public data only. Scores are free. Companies can never pay for anything about their own score. Last verified November 2026.
That places Startpage joint 787th of 934 companies scored, and joint 67th of 73 in SaaS / Digital Services.
What is Startpage doing well, and where does it fall short?
Strongest on Controversies & Red Flags and Carbon Footprint: Operations (8/10, 2/10). Weakest on Energy Source and Targets & Commitments (1/10, 1/10).
Where Startpage lost points
For each question that lost points, the evidence our public rubric looks for that we didn't find.
- Emissions from its own operations2/10No emissions figures for its own operations, not even an estimate from energy bills.
- Emissions from its supply chain2/10No assessment of where its supply-chain emissions come from.
- Whether its emissions are falling2/10No evidence its emissions are falling, not even from energy bills or mileage.
- How clean its energy is1/10No renewable energy tariff or major efficiency investment shown.
- Its effect on nature2/10No assessment of its effect on nature, and no basic environmental policy.
- How it uses materials and handles waste2/10No active waste reduction, reuse or repair shown.
- Its effect on water2/10No monitoring of water use, or no measures to reduce it.
- Its climate targets1/10No emissions reduction targets.
- How openly it reports1/10No sustainability information published.
A score changes when the evidence does. We use new published evidence at the next rescore. Anyone can send us new evidence, free. How to send it.
How is Startpage's SINK score calculated?
Same ten questions for every company. No private weighting.
SINK = (0.3 × Base + 0.7 × Performance) × ScaleWhat evidence is Startpage's score based on?
13 sources used in this assessment. All publicly available. Each row shows which of the ten questions it informed.
23% of them were published by Startpage itself; the rest come from independent sources.
10 of 13 sources are independent of the company.
“are based in the Netherlands. And these data centers utilize energy efficient, green technologies.”
“now two billion searches per year are delivered in maximum privacy”
“Those links are retrieved from platforms such as Google AdSense”
“Despite pitching itself as an alternative to Google and as a search engine with a focus on privacy, it actually makes use of Google search.”
“Bing will feed content into the Startpage News tab”
“Unfortunately, we can't find any evidence in our Green Web Dataset that this website runs on green energy.”
“only StartPage manages to combine a low carbon impact and lower consumption of memory resources”
“We launched the world’s first private search engine in the Netherlands in 2006”
“This delisting does not necessarily mean Startpage is violating its privacy policy. We have no evidence of that.”
“In October 2019, we learned that System1 had become the majority shareholder in Startpage.com via a new System1 subsidiary, Privacy One Group.”
“System1 is an advertising company – a keyword pay-per-click advertising company, to be more precise.”
“Questions about the exact ownership structure have gone unanswered, aside from general statements.”
“Startpage is a search engine based in Zeist, the Netherlands, that's been around since 2006”
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How does Startpage compare with other saas / digital services companies?
Where Startpage sits among saas / digital services peers.
Among the 73 major saas / digital services brands we've scored, Startpage is tied =67th of 73, with 3 others.
Who scores higher in SaaS / Digital Services?
The 3 companies in the sector scoring nearest above Startpage.
Proton publishes no emissions data, renewable energy figures or climate targets, although it runs data centres in Switzerland, Germany and Norway.
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