Search vs. navigate vs. ask:

How people behave on websites – do they search, navigate or ask?

Navigating and searching are both important ways of finding desirable content. How important is the internal search box on your website?

Cludo

Key takeaways

Searching and navigating aren’t rivals. Most visitors use both, depending on what they need.
Research has found that 43% of people visiting a homepage go straight to the search bar.
Searchers tend to know exactly what they want. Navigators tend to be exploring.
Today there’s a third behavior to design for: visitors who just want to ask a question.

At a conference we attended, one of the participants asked a question that caught us off guard: “Do we really need a search box on our homepage? Do people even use it?”

We’ll be honest: that question gave us pause. We work in site search every day, so we know its value well. But that brave and honest participant made us realize we needed more than our own conviction to convince others. There was a knowledge gap around the value of site search, and to fill it, we needed some research.

When we started digging, we came across comments like these:

“I feel like I can never find what I’m looking for with a search box. Maybe that’s just me…”

“For blogs and informational websites, I often don’t trust the built-in search to return better results than I’d get from Google.”

Source: Nielsen Norman Group, Search: Visible and Simple.

We live in the age of Google, Bing, and now AI assistants like ChatGPT, all of which can answer almost anything in seconds. So do you really need search on your own site when people “already have” Google?

If your website has a complex structure and a lot of content, the short answer is yes. A website only works when visitors can find what they came for, and that’s where site search comes in.

Search box vs. navigation: an eternal battle… or not?

Navigating and searching both have an important place on the modern web, but it can feel like there’s always been a battle between the two. Website owners tend to either underestimate the search box or expect it to fix every navigation and UX problem they have.

Good navigation and a clear linking structure are vital. Browsing is still the main way people get around millions of websites. But as a site grows, structured navigation alone gets harder to manage, and visitors are increasingly comfortable using search to find content on large sites.

Searching: the visitor knows what they want and types it.

Navigating: the visitor follows the menu the site lays out.

43%of people visiting a homepage go straight to the search boxSource: Forrester and Nielsen Norman Group

59%of web visitors regularly use a site’s internal search to get aroundSource: Comprend

15%would rather use search than a site’s menuSource: Comprend

According to Comprend, 59% of web visitors regularly use a site’s internal search to get around, and 15% would rather use search than the menu. Behavioral studies cited by Forrester and Nielsen Norman Group found that 43% of people landing on a homepage head straight for the search box to navigate.

That’s why search isn’t a nice-to-have anymore. It’s the standard. Any website with complex content and thousands of pages needs search, and it needs to be good, because visitors now expect it to work as well as Google. If it doesn’t, they leave.

Broadly, we see three ways websites balance the two:

Search first

Search is front and center, and navigation mostly links to accounts and profiles. Think Amazon and other large marketplaces.

Best for: huge catalogs where browsing everything isn’t realistic

The combo

Standard menus (top, dropdown, or side) plus a clearly visible search box. This is the approach used by millions of sites.

Best for: universities, governments, and most content-rich sites

Navigation only

Menus with no search box, or one that’s nearly invisible. Common on small sites and visual-first pages.

Best for: sites under about 200 pages, campaign pages, portfolios

So should websites drop navigation altogether and let visitors explore through search? Will we soon see sites with no main menu at all?

The answer is no. Every visitor is different. Some are better at recognizing things than recalling them, and some prefer to find content on their own rather than follow the paths a site lays out. Search and navigation should work hand in hand, not compete.

Known patterns in searching and navigating

Looking across research from Nielsen Norman Group, Forrester, and Comprend, a few clear patterns stand out:

	People who search	People who navigate
What they know	Exactly what they’re looking for, often down to a specific product or page name	Roughly what they need, and they’re open to related content
Where they are	Late in the journey, ready to act or buy	Earlier on, still gathering information
Who’s in control	The visitor sets the path	The site guides them to a destination
On mobile	Strongly preferred, since typing a query beats tapping through menus	Complex menus seldom work well on small screens
When stuck	Search is the escape hatch	Visitors give up on the menu and switch to search

The takeaway: every website has different types of visitors, and good design and UX should serve all of them. The best designs combine a prominent search box for people who search with clear navigation for people who browse, without narrowing in on just one group.

Customer example

Vejen Municipality, Denmark

We looked at one of our own customers, Vejen Municipality. With an average of 1,200 visitors a day, their search results page ranks among the most-visited pages on the whole site. That shows how central site search is to residents finding what they need.

Source: Cludo Analytics data for vejen.dk

#3most-visited page on the site

#6most frequently accessed page directly

500search terms with results, searched every day on average

Do your visitors search or navigate?

Get an audit of how people use search on your site, and where they’re giving up.

Get your search audit

The new option: visitors who just want to ask

When this debate started, there were two ways to find content: click through menus or type keywords. Today there’s a third. Visitors who’ve grown used to AI assistants increasingly skip both and simply ask a question in plain language, expecting a direct answer instead of a list of links.

Navigate

Browse menus to find the right section.

Admissions → Undergraduate → Deadlines

Search

Type keywords and scan the results.

“application deadline”

Ask

Ask a question and get an answer.

“When do I need to apply for fall?”

This doesn’t replace search or navigation. It’s one more way people want to find things. Tools like AI Summary, AI Chat, and AI Mode add that conversational layer on top of site search, with answers drawn from your own content.

What it all means for your website

To design for how people actually use your site, you need to understand your visitors and their patterns. If you’re still unsure whether you need intelligent search, start with your own data:

Track what people search for. Set up search term tracking in Google Analytics to see what visitors type into your search box. Here’s how to track zero search results in Google Analytics.
Find the dead ends. Searches with no results show where content is missing or hard to find.
Compare search and navigation paths. If your search results page is one of your most-visited pages, as it is for Vejen, search is already a core part of the visitor journey.
Make search as good as Google. Use tools like boosting to put your most important content first.

Internal search is more popular than ever. That’s expected in an age when even small children learn how to use search engines and AI assistants. Visitors arrive already knowing how to search, and they expect your site to keep up.

From a business standpoint, intelligent search that delivers results as relevant as Google’s makes visitors much less likely to leave your site for an external search. If they do leave, your competitors may show up first, and you could lose potential customers.

Frequently asked questions

Do websites still need a search bar?

Yes, if your site has a complex structure or a lot of content. Research has found that 43% of homepage visitors go straight to the search box, and many visitors use search as a backup when navigation doesn’t get them where they need to go. Small sites with fewer than about 200 pages can often rely on navigation alone.

What percentage of website visitors use site search?

According to Comprend, 59% of web visitors regularly use a site’s internal search to get around, and 15% prefer search over a site’s menu. Studies cited by Forrester and Nielsen Norman Group found that 43% of homepage visitors go straight to the search box.

What’s the difference between users who search and users who navigate?

Searchers usually know exactly what they want and are often further along in their journey. Navigators are usually exploring, gathering information, and open to related content. Most websites need to serve both.

Is site search more important on mobile?

Yes. Complex menus rarely work well on small screens, so mobile visitors often skip navigation and type a query to go straight to results.

How is AI changing the way visitors find content?

Visitors increasingly expect to ask questions in plain language and get a direct answer. AI-powered search features like AI Summary and AI Chat add that conversational layer to site search, using the content on your own website.

Give your visitors every way to find it

See how Cludo combines site search with AI answers, built on your own content.

Book a demo