What People Looked Up In 2015

Google released its annual Year-in search video, looking back at the questions which mattered to people around the world and defined the general narrative of 2015.

Undoubtedly, one of the most haunting pictures from the year is that of drowned Syrian toddler, Alan Kurdi, lying face down on a beach after an attempt to escape from war-torn Syria. The incident brought international attention to the refugee problem spurring the search “how can I help the refugees”, which the video starts off with.

The two-minute video is set against the audio from Caitlyn Jenner’s ESPYs speech, and covers questions like “how can we overcome prejudice”, marriage equality, “what colour is the dress” and “how can we rebuild Nepal”.

In India, according to Google Trends, e-commerce sites dominated searches overall with Flipkart taking the top spot, followed by IRCTC, SBI, Amazon and Snapdeal.

In terms of trending searches, unsurprisingly the ICC Cricket World Cup tops the list, trailed by some of the biggest Bollywood releases of the year—Bahubali, Bajrangi Bhaijaan and Prem Ratan Dhan Payo.

Amongst public figures, Sunny Leone, Salman Khan and former president APJ Abdul Kalam takes the first three spots. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, too features on the list coming in at tenth place.

Here’s the month by month recap of what people search for in 2015:

December
1. Floods in Chennai (26M+)
2. Star Wars (155M+)

November
1. Paris under attack (897M+)
2. COP21 Paris (13M+)

October
1. Water on Mars (10M+)
2. Sehwag retires (9M+)

September
1. Volkswagen emission (13M+)

July
1. Women’s World Cup (113M+)
2. Iran Nuclear deal (20M+)
3. Greece on the brink (35M+)

June
1. Maggi tainted food scare (32M+)
2. China crisis (12M+)

April
1. FIFA in crisis (42M+)
2. Nepal earthquake (85M+)

March
1. Cricket World Cup (323M+)

February
1. The Dress (73M+)