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Unblock Brave Search without the Brave browser

Brave Search gets blocked in 2 very different places: on networks that keep one search engine and refuse the rest, and nationally in mainland China. Both end the same way, with a filter notice where the results should be. You can open it in the tab you already have: paste search.brave.com into the launch box, press Launch, and the search box comes up through one of TrickyBird’s addresses.

There is nothing to install first. That matters more here than on most sites, because Brave Search is the engine built into the Brave browser, and the advice you will find is to install that browser or a VPN, on a school or work laptop that was set up to refuse both of them along with any extension that would do the same job. TrickyBird is a web proxy: a page rather than a program, so opening it takes the same permission as opening any other page, which is none.

No account is involved at any point, on either side.

What to expect from Brave Search

The search box, a results page, and a query typed straight into the box all came through on one of TrickyBird’s addresses, with Brave Search’s own carried encoded inside it rather than spelled out. That is what we saw on a desktop.

Is search.brave.com blocked on your network?

The check asks search.brave.com for one small file directly from your connection, not through TrickyBird, so your network can see that request like any direct visit.

One of our addresses, with the site’s encoded into it

The site loads in the tab you are already in, and this address will not always look the same, since sometimes it is only numbers.

Why is Brave Search blocked?

Most filters keep one search engine and deny the others. The one they keep is the one they can police: SafeSearch is forced onto it through DNS or an added header, and an engine outside that arrangement cannot be steered the same way. Denying it is less work than allowing it. That is category filtering rather than a decision about Brave Search, which is why it disappears on a network where another search box loads fine. The notice you land on says the site is not permitted and offers no way to ask why.

Mainland China is the other case, and it is not a filter anyone can appeal to. GreatFire’s live test of Brave Search from inside the country reads 100% blocked, so a different network in the same country changes nothing.

How does TrickyBird open Brave Search?

Brave Search sends its results as finished HTML, so what arrives through TrickyBird is the page it would have sent your browser anyway, with the addresses inside it rewritten to point back at us. Your browser never reaches Brave Search itself: TrickyBird makes that request and brings the answer back, page assets and images included. A small script in the tab catches what the page requests later, which is how your next query stays on our address instead of jumping back to the site.

The address bar shows one of our own addresses instead of the site’s. It won’t always look the same; sometimes it is just numbers. A bookmark or a copied link from that tab points at us, not at the page.

Why Brave Search, when another search box already works?

Because it answers from its own index instead of reselling the rankings of a bigger engine. When a filter leaves you with one approved search box, what you lose is a different set of results, not a second opinion on the same ones. If any search box will do, DuckDuckGo has its own page here.

Questions

Do I need the Brave browser to use Brave Search?

No. Brave Search is a website, and it opens in whatever browser you already have. That is the part that matters on a locked-down laptop: you cannot install the Brave browser there, and you do not need to. Open TrickyBird, paste search.brave.com, press Launch, and the search box loads in the same tab.

Do results really load, or only the search box?

Both. The results page renders through TrickyBird, and so does a query typed into the box on the home page: press Enter and the results come back on our address rather than on Brave Search’s. We watched that happen on a desktop, with an ordinary one-word query.

Is Brave Search blocked in mainland China?

Yes. GreatFire tests Brave Search from inside the country and reads it as 100% blocked, with every conclusive test failing. That is a standing national block rather than one network having a bad day, so moving to different Wi-Fi inside the country does not help.

Do I need an account?

No, on either side. Brave Search answers queries without a login, and TrickyBird has no sign-up at all. The only account link on the results page leads to a paid Brave subscription, which buys extras and is not needed for searching.

Does Brave Search see my IP address?

No. Brave Search sees TrickyBird’s server connecting, not your device. To run the service and stop abuse, the edge keeps a shortened form of your IP address, the hostname of the site you connected to, and basic response details, kept for at most 48 hours, with no account attached.

Other sites people unblock

Open Brave Search now

Press the button and the site opens in this tab. You do not need to install anything or create an account.