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MetaGer

German nonprofit metasearch run by SUMA-EV in Hanover. Prepaid anonymous keys, AGPL source, and results mixed from third-party indexes.

Open source
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MetaGer is a metasearch engine operated by SUMA-EV, a registered nonprofit association in Hanover, Germany. It does not crawl the whole web itself. It queries several third-party indexes, then re-ranks and filters the combined list with its own scoring rules.

The project started in 1996 at the University of Hanover and moved to SUMA-EV on 1 October 2012. The association publishes the service source code under the GNU Affero GPL on its GitLab instance. There is no US parent. The operator says it does not keep search IP addresses or user-agent strings, and it does not run advertising profiles.

The concrete differentiator is the prepaid anonymous key: you generate a random key without an email or named account, add credit as tokens, and search ad-free. Browser extension and Android app users can authenticate with one-time blind-signature tokens so a search request does not need to send the long-lived key.

Since September 2024, after Yahoo ended its German search-and-ads contract, SUMA-EV says the old ad-financed search is gone and paid-key search is the operating model. That is a capacity and index-mix constraint, not a reason to invent a full European web index that MetaGer does not have.

German nonprofit (SUMA-EV)AGPL open sourcePrepaid anonymous keysMetasearch (mixed indexes)Tor + anonymous browse

Shortlist MetaGer when you want a German nonprofit, AGPL-published metasearch with prepaid keys and no named account. Skip it when you need a first-party web index, a staffed enterprise contract, or a guarantee that queries never leave the EU. In those cases consider Qwant or Mojeek, or a self-hosted SearXNG instance.

Key capabilities

MetaGer queries multiple partner indexes, converts their ranks into scores, then adds or subtracts points for query terms in the URL and snippet. Users can enable or disable engines per focus (web, images, news). The published partner list includes Mojeek, Brave Search, and Serper as a Google-index path. This is a mixer, not a full first-party web crawl.

A MetaGer key is a randomly generated credential. The keys pages state that signup does not require a name or email. Credit is added as tokens that are consumed per ad-free search. The same key can be copied to other devices via login code, URL, file, QR, or manual entry. Cash payment is offered alongside conventional methods.

The official Android app and the Chrome or Firefox extension can authenticate searches with one-time tokens created on the device. MetaGer documents an RSA blind-signature flow so the long-lived key is not sent with each query. This is a proof-oriented anonymity feature, not a claim that partner indexes never see the query text.

Each result can be opened through a server-side browser that MetaGer says runs on SUMA-EV infrastructure, hides the visitor IP from the destination site, and is deleted when the session ends. If the isolated browser is unavailable, help text describes a simpler proxy at proxy.suma-ev.de that stays on subsequent links.

A published .onion address serves the search UI over Tor. Settings allow a personal domain blacklist and a search-on-this-domain action. Separate foci cover images and news. Science results can draw on BASE and TUBdok. Citation search is described as staying on MetaGer's own server rather than being relayed.

A colpo d'occhio

HQ
Hanover, Germany
Legal entity
SUMA-EV e.V. (VR200033, Amtsgericht Hanover)
License
GNU AGPL v3 (gitlab.metager.de)
Commercial model
Prepaid tokens; association membership (German-speaking countries)
Hosting
Hetzner Online GmbH (operator-administered)
Published web indexes
Mojeek, Brave Search, Serper (Google)

Best fit when

  • German or EU teams that want a nonprofit, AGPL-published search front end as the browser default
  • Users who will pay with a no-email prepaid key and optionally use blind-signature tokens via the app or extension
  • People who need Open Anonymously or the Tor onion in addition to a results list
  • Libraries or research desks that will actually switch the science focus (BASE, TUBdok, citation search)
  • Buyers who accept that queries are mixed from Mojeek, Brave, and Google-via-Serper rather than a single EU crawl

Poor fit when

  • Anyone who needs a first-party web index or contractual result quality against Google or Bing
  • Procurement that requires ISO 27001, SOC 2, an independent no-logs audit, or a published B2B DPA
  • Policies that forbid sending query text to US-group search APIs (Brave, Serper/Google)
  • Orgs that need a staffed SLA after the September 2024 Yahoo termination and staff redundancies
  • Teams that want official turnkey self-host with supported index-API packaging

Consider instead when

  • When: You need a European consumer search brand with a larger product organisation and can accept a less inspectable stack

    Consider: Qwant (France) or Ecosia (Germany)

    Neither is an AGPL association service in the MetaGer sense.

  • When: You want one independent crawl instead of a metasearch hop

    Consider: Mojeek

    Mojeek is already listed as a MetaGer web source; using it directly removes the mixer.

  • When: You need to run the mixer on your own infrastructure and bring index APIs yourself

    Consider: SearXNG (self-hosted)

    MetaGer source is public under AGPL but is not packaged as a supported self-host product.

  • When: Staff already standardise on a US privacy search box and you only care about daily result quality

    Consider: DuckDuckGo (non-European)

    Not in European scope; listed only as the common incumbent privacy default.

Giurisdizione e proprietà

Soggetto giuridico
SUMA-EV - Verein für freien Wissenszugang (e.V.)
Capogruppo / controllo USA
Nessuna capogruppo USA nota
Esposizione CLOUD Act (indicativa)
Medium
Hosting / residenza
Operator-administered services on hardware rented from Hetzner Online GmbH (Germany). Search queries are forwarded to third-party indexes including Mojeek (UK), Brave Search (US), and Serper for Google. Payments may involve PayPal. Backup, CDN, and a full subprocessor list are not published.

No known US parent. German e.V. plus Hetzner hosting does not keep query text in the EU when US-group indexes are enabled. Indicative only, not legal advice.

  • Independent security / no-logs auditNot found
  • ISO 27001Not found
  • SOC 2 / SOC 3Not found
  • GDPR / EU data protectionVendor claimed
  • +3

Considerations & known limitations

  • HighThird-party index and 2024 funding shock

    Yahoo ended the German search-and-ads contract in September 2024. SUMA-EV said ad-financed search stopped, staff were made redundant, and remaining service is a smaller prepaid-key niche. Result quality still depends on paid partner indexes.

  • MediumQuery text leaves SUMA-EV

    Privacy policy states the search query is sent to partners and results are kept a few hours for display. Enabling Brave or Serper/Google sends query text to US-group services even if MetaGer does not log your IP.

  • MediumNo public independent audit

    No-logs and no-profiling claims are first-party. There is no public ISO 27001, SOC 2, or independent no-logs audit to show a security reviewer.

  • MediumVolunteer-scale operations

    After the 2024 announcement, do not assume a staffed status page, 24/7 support, or long-term maps continuity without asking. Help pages still contain leftover wording about a free ad-supported search.

  • LowPayment data at third parties

    Cash can avoid named payment accounts. Other methods include PayPal, cards, Wero, and SEPA. SUMA-EV says it does not store payment data; the processor still might.

Open questions for due diligence

  • Will SUMA-EV sign a B2B DPA and publish a current subprocessor list (backups, email, CDN)?
  • Which partner indexes are live on default web search today versus leftover help or Wikipedia text (Bing/Yahoo, YaCy)?
  • What staffing, incident response, and availability commitment exists after the 2024 redundancies?
  • Is Maps.MetaGer.de still a supported product or best-effort leftover?
  • Does Serper's contract and region for Google results change the query-path assessment?
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Domande Frequenti

Both, with a heavy tilt to forwarding. The transparency page says MetaGer is not a pure metasearch engine because it also uses small indexes of its own, but it does not crawl a Google-scale web corpus. The search-engine page lists Mojeek, Brave Search, and Serper (Google index) as web sources. The privacy policy is explicit that the search query is transmitted to partners so results can be displayed.

Not necessarily. SUMA-EV hosts the site on Hetzner in Germany and says it does not save search IP or user-agent. The query text still goes to whichever partner indexes you leave enabled, including US-based Brave Search and Serper's Google path. Treat MetaGer as a German operator with a mixed query path, not as EU-only search.

Yes for the search product. Keys are random strings and can be shared across devices. The extension and Android app can replace the reusable key on the wire with one-time anonymous tokens. SUMA-EV membership applications are currently limited to German-speaking countries. There is no public click-through B2B DPA on the pages reviewed, so procurement still has homework.

SUMA-EV announced on 10 September 2024 that Yahoo ended the German search-and-ads contract, that ad-financed search stopped, that staff were made redundant, and that prepaid-key search would continue on a smaller, largely voluntary basis. The public site, key shop, GitLab, Tor onion, and maps hostname were still published at research time. Do not assume enterprise SLAs or rapid feature work without asking the association.

Source for the hosted service is published under GNU AGPL v3 on gitlab.metager.de. That is useful for audit and forks. There is no official turnkey self-host product with supported partner-API packaging. If you need to run a mixer on your own metal, compare a maintained SearXNG deployment and budget for index API contracts yourself.