As the world’s most popular search engine, and the first place most of us turn to find answers to practically any question, Google has come out with their latest Year in Search results. This is a list of the 10 most popular things ‘Googled’ in a specific country throughout the year, and paints a unique picture of the topics that were on the nation’s collective mind over the preceding 365 days.

South Africans were, as the top 10 list below shows, going rugby crazy throughout 2019, as we geared up to support our boys travelling to Japan for the Rugby World Cup. This is why two of the 10 things Googled by South Africans in 2019 involved rugby.

However, the strangest query of the year landed in number one position. It involved a breakfast cereal accused of being invented for the sole purpose of discouraging self-gratification among adolescent boys. Earlier in the year, social media posts claiming that Cornflakes were invented to prevent teenage boys masturbating were going viral. Understandably, South Africans turned to Google to see if the claim was true.

With rugby and cornflakes making up almost a third of 2019’s Google searches in South Africa, the topic that captured most of our attentions was the election. South Africans wanted to know when voting stations opened, how many votes were needed for a seat in parliament, and – surprisingly – who won the election in South Africa.

Making appearances in the top 10 were Cameron Boyce, with people wanting to know how he died, Bosasa, teenage pregnancy, and the media. Here’s Google’s list of the 10 most popular things Googled by South Africans in 2019:

1.       Why were cornflakes invented?

2.       What time is the rugby world cup final?

3.       How many votes for a seat in parliament?

4.       How did Cameron Boyce die?

5.       How long is a rugby match?

6.       What is Bosasa?

7.       What time do voting stations open?

8.       Who won the elections in South Africa?

9.       What is media?

10.  What is teenage pregnancy?

Questions aren’t the only things people search for on Google, which is why they also reveal a top 10 list of search terms.  These are simple words or phrases people punch into Google’s search bar and hit the enter button. It’s no surprise that topping the list for 2019 was ‘load shedding’.

With the elections a hot topic across the nation, two search terms that made it into the top ten were ‘IEC’ and ‘election results’. It seems like we went crazy for Avengers in 2019, because the third most searched term for the year was ‘thanos’.  Here’s Google’s list of the 10 most popular South African search phrases for 2019:

1.       Load shedding

2.       Election results

3.       Thanos

4.       IEC

5.       Fiona Viotti

6.       Black Friday Specials

7.       Gavin Watson

8.       Mark Batchelor

9.       Teacher’s Day

10.  Hoerskoel Driehoek.

The internet, specifically search engines like Google, is where we turn when we need to know something about the world around us. When it comes to finding out how Google itself works, people turn to accredited Google Partner marketing agencies like WSI. If you’d like to find out how Google does what it does, and the benefits of advertising a business on Google, chat to us today! Enjoyed our article on the top 10 things Googled by South Africans in 2019? Visit our blog to discover more interesting content!