A LOT of  facts, history, and stats about Google (and Alphabet)

Stats about Alphabet / Google’s Finances

• Google’s annual revenue in 2022 was $278 billion – a rise of over 8% from 2021. (source)
• In 2023, Google achieved its highest ever annual revenue at over $305 billion.
• In 2021, Google spent the most of any company in the world on R&D – $27 billion.
• The vast majority of Google’s revenue still comes from Google Ads in 2023. 77.8%. (source)
• ‘Cloud’ infrastructure and services make up around 12% of Google’s revenue in 2024. (source)
• Google controls around 8% of the cloud service market, with growth happening every year.
• Google has spent over 7% more in R&D in 2024 than it did in 2023, indicating that it understand that diversification is very important to its future.
• In 2022, it was predicted that the ‘GOOG’ stock price would dip in 2024, but instead, 2024 saw a lot of growth, with highs of over $191. Growth continued all through 2023 after poor results at the tail end of 2022. (source)
• With Google Search seeing desktop market share reaching its lowest point in 10 years (81.9% in 2024), it is expected that revenues will become much more diversified for the company in 2025 and beyond.
• In 2023, Google had over $100 billion in cash reserves.
• Google stock has brought an average annual return of over 20% since its IPO in 2004.

5 Google Images Stats

1. Around 1 billion people use Google images daily. (source)
2. Google search stats show that 10.1% of Google traffic is for images (source)
3. The most searched Google image is the moon landing image ‘One small step’ (source)
4. 19% of Google SERPs show images (source)
5. There are an estimated 136 billion indexed images on Google Image search (source)

Facts about Google Maps

• Google Maps boasts 1 billion active users worldwide monthly, including on Apple and Android devices. (source)
• Google Maps dominates across all mobile phone manufacturers, with 10 billion downloads from the Google Play Store. (source)
• Google Maps provides navigation in 220 different countries and territories (source).
• As of 2019, Trekker operations and the Street View car had combined to collect 170 billion images from 87 countries (source).
• More than 25 million businesses are listed on Google Maps (source).
• Business owners and users contribute more than 20 million pieces of information daily, constantly maintaining the app’s modernity. (source)
• Estimations suggest that Google Maps alone made $11.1 billion for its parent company in 2023 (source).
• By suggesting that users take a more eco-friendly driving route, it is estimated that Google Maps has contributed to preventing approximately 1.2 million metric tons of carbon emissions from being released into the atmosphere. (source)
• Over 1 billion km are driven daily across the globe through Google Maps (source)
• Google Maps can communicate in 50 different languages, serving millions of different users across the globe (source)

Did you know?

A ‘googol‘ is written as 10,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000!

Sergey Brin and Larry Page used a misspelling of ‘googol’ to name their new venture, and the rest is history.

Google Shopping Statistics

• Google Shopping sees approximately 1.2 billion monthly searches. (source)
• 83% of consumers state that being able to make returns easily is important to them, so this is worth considering when setting up Google Merchant Center. (source)
• 49% of consumers use Google to discover new products (source)
• On average, Google Shopping ads cost $0.66 each time someone clicks on them. (source)
• Around 60% of shopping-related queries on Google are upper-funnel. (source)
• Google Shopping Ads account for around 85% of all clicks on Google Ads and Shopping campaigns combined. (source)
• Over 5 million companies are actively using Google Merchant Center. (source)
• Ads on Google Shopping drive around 76% of search ad spend for the eCommerce sector. (source)
• On average, 1.91% of Google shoppers make purchases after visiting a product page. (source)
• Conversion value for Shopping ads is approximately 28% higher than when compared to text ads. (source)
• Searches on Google account for approximately 36% of product discovering. Using Shopping listings to your advantage can help your products feature high on the SERP. (source)
• Google Shopping clicks are growing by 17.7% every year. (source)
• When compared to text ads, Shopping ads are 85% more likely to drive traffic to a website. (source)
• On average, eCommerce brands usually allocate 80% of their PPC ad spend to Shopping campaigns. (source)
• 76% of retail search ad spending is derived from Google Shopping campaigns. (source)

All about Eric Schmidt

• Eric Schmidt was the CEO of Google from 2001 to 2011. He went on to become their Executive Chairman from 2011 to 2015. (source)
• When Schmidt was hired at Google, his salary was $250,000 as well as an annual performance bonus. (source)
• Schmidt left Alphabet (Google’s parent company) in June of 2019 after a tenure of 18 years. He did stay as a Technical Advisor for another 8 months, leaving in February 2020. (source)
• In 1983, Eric Schmidt worked as the first Software Manager at Sun Microsystems. (source)
• Before working at Google, Schmidt became Novell’s third CEO and Chairman in April of 1997. He worked there until 2001. (source)
• Schmidt became a billionaire (in US dollars) based on stock options received as an employee of a corporation. He was neither the founder nor a relative of a founder of these companies. (source)
• In August 2010, at the “Techonomy” conference, Schmidt spoke about the misuse of technology by people with bad intentions, saying the only way to manage challenges is with much greater transparency and no anonymity. (source)
• In July 2024, Schmidt said at an event at Stanford University that Google’s AI struggles are due to the rise of employees remote working. (source)
• Since he departed from Google, Schmidt has become an authority figure on AI, regularly posting his views on LinkedIn and being a spokesperson for AI’s place in the world. (source)
• In 2024, Schmidt said he believed that in the next 5 years, AI systems will be able to write and improve on their own code. (source)
• During Schmidt’s time at Google, he massively scaled its infrastructure and product offerings. Many new products and services were introduced including: Google News (2002), Blogger (2003), Google Books (2004), Gmail (2004), Google Earth (2005) and Google Maps (2005). (source)
• In 2024, Schmidt and his wife co-founded a nonprofit organisation called Schmidt Sciences. The goal of this organisation was to advance science and technology that deepens human understanding of the natural world and solutions to global problems. (source)
• Eric Schmidt’s net worth in November 2024 was $24.8B, making him the 81st richest person in the world. (source)
• Eric Schmidt was a member of President Barack Obama’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology in 2009. (source)

3 Stats about Google Books

1. In 2024, Google Books now contains over 40 million books in 500 languages. (source)
2. Using the Elphel camera, Google Books can scan and make digital 1,000 pages of text per hour. (source)
3. As of 2024, Google Books is now available in 75 countries and can be accessed by over 3 billion people. (source)

GFiber (Google Fiber) Statistics

• The location with the fastest Google Fiber speeds is Salt Lake City in Utah. Speeds have reached over 859 Mbps.
• The average latency on Google Fiber Internet speed tests is 19.08ms.
• 239.4 Mbps – the average download rate for Google Fiber (source)
• First Introduced in 2012, with the first location being Kansas City, Kansas. The area was chosen from over 1,100 applicants to be the first Google Fiber community.
• Expanded to Austin (TX) and Provo (UT) in 2013.
• Rebranded to GFiber in October 2023.
• Google created an April Fool’s joke around the product in 2012 by announcing that Google Fiber was an edible energy bar.

Statistics about Google Ads

• On a global scale, 80% of businesses use Google Ads (source)
• 63% of users have clicked on a Google ad (source)
• On a daily basis, around 61% of smartphone users engage in Google search (source)
• In 2023, Google Ads generated an overall revenue figure of $237.855 billion (source)
• Google has a market share of 93.5%, in the UK alone (source)
• The average CTR (click through rate) for Google Ads is between 4 and 6% (source)
• 65% of users click on a paid ad when making a purchase (source)
• The average CVR (conversion rate) on paid search ads is between 3 and 6% (source)
• On Google Ads, the average CPC (cost per click) is between £0.75 to £1.50 – this will vary industry to industry (source)
• Personalising ads could boost sales by 30% (source)
• The average ROI is 200% on Google Ads (source)
• Out of all internet users, 90% see a Google ad (source)
• 52% of users feel that they aren’t being culturally represented in ads (source)
• Local advertising is becoming even more crucial, with 97% of users going to the internet to find local businesses (as of 2022) (source)
• For B2B, the estimated traffic through paid search is 12% (source)
• The dating industry has the highest CVR for search ads, at 9.64% (source)
• Around 45% of smaller businesses have a paid search marketing strategy (source)
• 96% of brands spend some of their marketing budget on Google Ads (source)
• For commercial- intent keywords, ads receive 65% of clicks compared to 35% for organic results (source)
• Taking a closer look at online users, 58% of millennials said that they made an online purchase because of an online ad (source)

All about Sundar Pichai (Google CEO)

• Sundar Pichai’s real name is Pichai Sundararajan, and he was born on the 10th June in 1972 (source)
• He became the CEO of Google on the 10th of August, 2015 after previously being Chief Product Officer. He then became the Alphabet CEO in 2019 (source)
• He was rumored to have been considered for the role of CEO of Microsoft in 2014, prior to this prestigious job going to Satya Nadella (source)
• It only took 11 years for him to work his way from leading product management for the Chrome Toolbar all the way to the very top job (source)
• He was heavily involved in the development of the Chrome browser, released in 2008, which resolved a core issue at Google which was that Internet Explorer was the browser installed by default on most computers (source)
• Sundar Pichai’s base salary at Google is reported to be around $2 million USD per year. Taking into account his various stock options and bonuses, this has been calculated that they could reach up to $280 million USD per year, depending on stock performance (source)
• Sundar Pichai net worth in 2024 is estimated to be around $1,68 billion USD. This vast wealth has been gathered by his salary, various investments but, most significantly by his stock holdings in Alphabet, Google’s parent company (source)
• In 2022 he was reportedly one of the highest paid CEO’s in the world, with an estimated $226 million USD earned (source)
• Pichai’s leadership style is said to be “inclusive and transformative”. It is said that he “emphasizes collaboration and open communication, encouraging employees to share ideas freely” (source) It thus makes sense that when people describe his personality they say he is a very empathetic and thoughtful man with an even temper (source)
• Sundar Pichai has an undergraduate degree from the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur in “metallurgy engineering” which, according to topuniversities.com “involves investigation of the chemical and physical properties of metallic elements, compounds and alloys.” (source)
• He then went on to complete his Masters at Stanford University in material sciences and engineering (source). This was reportedly on a scholarship (source)
• Sundar Pichai doesn’t have a PHD, despite wishes from his parents that he would continue his studies after Stanford. (source)
• Before he started his career at Google, he had jobs at Applied Materials and McKinsey & Company (source)
• The products that Pichai has overseen in his career at Google include Google Search, Maps, Play, Android, Chrome, Gmail, Google Workspace, and Chromebook (source).
• He is a huge advocate of AI and has announced that over a quarter of the new code generated at Google is now created using AI (source)
• Pichai has a wife and two children. His wifes name is Anjali Pichai (née Haryani) and they met when studying at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), in Kharagpur, India (source)
• Sundar Pichai has a son named Kiran Pichai who was born in 2005 (source), and a daughter called Kavya (source) In 2015 he said he would always be home to put his children in bed (source)
• Pichai and his family live in an mansion in Los Altos Hills in California (source). The house is worth a whopping $40 million USD and sits at a huge 31.17 acres (source)
• Pichai’s car collection reportedly includes two Mercedes (V Class and the S650) as well as a BMW 730 LD (source)
• Pichai has an amazing memory for numbers, and can apparently remember every phone number he has ever dialled (source)
• He is a big cricket fan, often sharing Cricket news on his X (formerly known as Twitter) account (source)
• He is a vegetarian, and takes a lot of care for his personal health and fitness (source)

Notable Incidents in Google’s History

• Google was originally named BackRub, before changing to Google in September 1997 when the domain was first registered (source).
• The company Google INC. was officially founded on September 4th 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin (source).
• The first Google Doodle appeared in August 1998, to let people know Larry and Sergey were out of the office for the Burning Man Festival (source).
• Since then, the brand has grown in stature and launched several other subsidiaries, including Google AdWords in 2000 (source).
• In July 2001, Google Image Search was launched alongside Google’s regular search offering (source).
• By the end of 2021, over one billion URLs have been stored on Google (source).
• Google News was established in 2002 as a beta version (source).
• Klingon was adopted as a language variant in 2002 (source).
• In 2004, Gmail was launched, which is now one of the most popular email platforms on the planet (source).
• 2004 was a big year for Google, as it was the year the company first became a public trading company on NASDAQ (source).
• Another popular Google platform called Google Maps was released in 2005 (source).
• In 2006, Google acquired the video streaming service YouTube for a hefty $1.65 billion (source).
• In 2007, Google innovated once again, introducing Google Street View to the world (source).
• September 2008 is a busy month for the company, with both Google Chrome and Android OS being released (source).
• Voice Search was officially introduced on Android in 2009 (source).
• One of the world’s first tablets was delivered by Google in 2010, known as the Nexus One (source).
• Google’s new foray into the social networking world occurred in 2011 with Google+ (source).
• In 2011, Google registered more than a billion unique users for the first time (source).
• In 2015, Google was restructured into a new holding company known as Alphabet Inc (source).
• The first generation of the Google Pixel was released in 2016, breaking new ground within the world of smartphones (source).
• Google’s AI chatbot program, BARD is introduced in 2023 (source).
• In September 2023, Google celebrated its 25th anniversary (source).

Interesting Facts About Google Meet

• Google Meet has over 300 million active users per month, Microsoft Teams has over 145 million (source)
• Google Meet video calls don’t provide official figures, but estimates suggests it used around 50-100mb of data per hour for audio calls only (source)
• Google meet is optimised for low-bandwidth mobile networks through WebRTC and QUIC over UDP (Source)
• Google Meet has the best advantage of video conferencing tools as many people use Google have existing accounts (source)
• Google Meet adheres to the standards set by the IETF security for datagram and transport layer security (DTLS) and Secure real time transport protocol (SRTP) (source)
• Top Countries for Google Meet are United States, India and Italy (source)
• Google Meet daily active users in the UK as of May 2020 had 60,000 daily users (source)

Products that Google has Killed off

• In total, Google has killed 296 notable services/products since 2006. (source)
• Google Answers, an online knowledge market where users could pay researchers to find answers was killed in 2006 after being available for 4 years. (source)
• Google Web Accelerator was killed in 2008 after being available for 2-3 years. The client-side service was designed to speed up the loading time of web pages by around 2 seconds. (source)
• Google Audio Ads was shut down after just 7 months in 2009. This allowed advertisers in the US to run audio ads on AM/FM radio stations in the US, all through the Adwords interface. More modern iterations have become available through Youtube and other audio interfaces in recent years. (source)
• Grand Central was a VOIP service that was acquired by Google in 2005 and killed in 2009 when Google Voice was launched. (source)
• Real Estate in Google Maps was launched in 2009 and killed in 2011. It allowed users to find properties for sale/rent directly in Google Maps. (source)
• Google Real-Time Search launched in 2009 and allowed users to retrieve real-time results from Facebook, Twitter, and participating news websites. The service was killed in 2011. (source)
• Google Directory was an internet website directly that allowed users to users to explore websites that were sorted into 14 categories. This was killed in 2011. (source)
• Google Labs, the experimental technology arm of Google which was used to showcase new products, was killed in 2011, which resulted in the closure of many products/services around this time. (source)
• Google Desktop was a tool which allowed users to search local files including emails, photos, music, files, and webpage history. Google killed the tool in 2011. (source)
• Google PowerMeter debuted around the same time as smart meters but before energy providers started installing them as standard. It allowed users to track energy usage in their homes. After two years, it was killed in 2011 after consumer uptake didn’t meet expectations. (source)
• Google Notebook was a tool which allowed you to clip information from websites when conducting research. It was just over 3 years old when Google decided to kill it in 2011. (source)
• Urchin, the first iteration of what users will know now as Google Analytics, was killed in 2012 following the launch of Universal Analytics, a much more comprehensive tool for tracking website visitor information. (source)
• Google Video was a free video hosting platform which allowed users to embed videos on other websites. After 7 years it was killed in 2012 so Google could focus solely on YouTube which it had acquired 3 years earlier. (source)
• Less than a year after acquiring Sparrow, an email client designed for iOS and OS X, in 2012 Google killed the product entirely. (source)
• Google SMS was a service which allowed users to text basic questions and request updates on weather and sport. After 8 years in 2013, Google killed the service as the world transitioned over to smartphones. (source)
• Google Talk was 7 years old when it was killed by Google in 2013. Better remembered by the name GChat, it allowed users to communicate via instant messages and by voice. (source)
• One of the more controversial closures in recent memory is Google Reader, an RSS/Atom feed aggregator widely used to collate updates from user-preferred sources across the web. Killed in 2013, it had been active for over 7 years. (source)
• iGoogle was a start page for the internet which allowed users to create a personalised web portal or Google Homepage. Killed in 2013, Google reasoned that the need for it had declined. (source)
• Google Checkout was killed in 2013. It was designed as a payment processor to make paying for online purchases more accessible to users. (source)
• Google Questions and Answers was a free-to-access knowledge market similar to Quora. It was killed in 2014 after 7 years and around the same time as the launch of the answer box in search results. (source)
• The recently resurrected Google TV was initially killed in 2013 when Google launched Chromecast. In recent years the Chromecast has been discontinued and replaced with a new version of Google TV. (source)
• The Google Glass Explorer Edition was an optical device worn by users which had a head-up display to allow users to interact with the world around them using natural language. After two years, Google killed the product in 2015. (source)
• Google Code, a software development platform which had revision controls, a wiki for code, and also issue trackers, was killed by Google in 2015 after usage declined. It had been live for nearly 11 years. (source)
• Google Compare was only live for a year before Google decided to kill it in 2016. The service allowed users to compare financial products including insurance, mortgages, and credit cards. (source)
• Google Now was a card-based user interface which predicted what users wanted to see and displayed that information as updates to them in Chrome or the Google App on Android and iOS devices. Google killed it after 4 years in 2016. (source)
• As the usage of Adobe Flash was being superseded by HTML5, Google launched a product called Google Swiffy which allowed users to convert SWF files to HTML5. It was killed in 2016 as the need for the product had declined considerably. (source)
• Google Nexus was Google’s original lineup of smartphones that launched in 2010 and later included tablets running a stock version of Android. After six years, Google discontinued the range in favour of Google Pixels. (source)
• Build with Chrome was a partnership between Google and Lego which was live for around 3 years before being killed in 2017. It allowed users to build and share Lego creations on digital plots of land within Google Maps. (source)
• Google Map Maker was killed in 2017 after 4 years as most of the features to create your own map overlays were integrated directly into Google Maps. (source)
• YouTube Video Editor was available for 7 years before Google killed it in 2017. It was a web-based video editor which allowed users to edit, merge, and add special effects to videos. It was replaced around a year later with YouTube Studio Editor. (source)
• After 10 years, Google killed its Site Search feature in 2018. The tool allowed website developers to add a custom site search box powered by Google to their websites. (source)