Safari Profiles: Set Different Search Engines on Mac

While Safari 17 brought profile support to macOS 13 Ventura, you cannot set different default search engines for separate profiles. The default search engine selection in Safari is a global application setting that applies uniformly across your primary browsing session and all configured profiles.

Why Safari Does Not Support Per-Profile Search Engines

When Apple introduced Profiles in Safari 17 (available on macOS Ventura and later), the feature was designed to separate browsing data such as history, cookies, website data, extensions, Tab Groups, and favorites.

However, core application preferences remain universal. If you navigate to Safari > Settings > Search, changing the Search engine option (to Google, Yahoo, Bing, DuckDuckGo, or Ecosia) automatically changes the default provider for every profile. Furthermore, the Safari > Settings > Profiles panel contains customization options only for the profile's name, icon, color, favorites folder, and open tab behaviors—it lacks an independent search engine selector.

Workarounds for Using Multiple Search Engines

If your workflow requires distinct search engines for different contexts (such as DuckDuckGo for personal research and Google for work), consider the following solutions:

  1. Use Direct Navigation or Bookmarks: Set the homepage or a prominent favorite in your secondary profile to the URL of your preferred alternative search engine (e.g., duckduckgo.com). While this does not allow direct searching from the Smart Search Field (address bar), it provides immediate access to the engine upon opening a new tab.
  2. Employ Third-Party Safari Extensions: Certain productivity extensions and search managers available in the Mac App Store allow you to set custom search keywords or redirect queries. Because Safari allows you to toggle extensions on or off per profile, you can enable a redirect extension exclusively within a specific profile.
  3. Use a Secondary Web Browser: If independent, address-bar-level search defaults are essential to your separation of tasks, use another browser that natively supports per-profile search engine configurations, such as Google Chrome, Brave, or Microsoft Edge. Alternatively, designate Safari for one workflow with your preferred engine and a secondary browser for the other.