The Rugby World Cup, Gay Byrne, boomers, Rebekah Vardy, and the backstop were among the nation’s defining Google searches this year. As 2019 draws to a close, the search engine has released the trending topics that dominated Google searches across the country.
Google’s ‘Year in Search’ provides a snapshot of the events, questions, personalities, and scandals that piqued the country’s curiosities during the year. Despite Ireland’s hopes being dashed in the early stages of the tournament, the Rugby World Cup topped the overall most-searched list for 2019.
This was mainly due to searches for match highlights and the pool games, right through to the final and the emotional speech given by South African captain Siya Kolisi following his team’s victory.
Storm Lorenzo, Game of Thrones, and the EU election results were also among the overall top trending searches, with Gay Byrne, Brendan Grace, Cameron Boyce, and Luke Perry also featuring following their deaths throughout the year.
With Shane Lowry the most Googled person here in 2019, beauty guru James Charles of YouTube fame pipped British prime minister Boris Johnson to take second place on the list of most searched people.
Swing-gate TD Maria Bailey and Rebekah Vardy, who was accused of leaking private information about the Rooney family to The Sun by fellow Wag Coleen, also appear on this list.
When it comes to the most searched for recipes, vegan meals topped the list, followed by searches for keto and smoothie recipes. Plant-based recipes also made an appearance, as did healthy dinners, courgette, and salmon recipes. A sign of our changing diets, not a single unhealthy recipe features in the top 10.
And while veganism topped the most searched recipes list, suggesting the nation’s changing diet, many of us were still grappling with the basics, with ‘how to boil an egg’ topping the most searched ‘How to’ list.
Other eternal questions the nation turned to their search engine for answers included ‘how to lose belly fat’, ‘how to stop snoring’ and ‘how to get rid of spots’.
The Kardashians also continued to perplex the nation in 2019, with ‘how to pronounce Psalm?’ trending as Kim and Kayne welcomed their third child.
Among the most common questions Ireland asked Google this year included ‘what is a dead ting?’, a reference to an insult delivered during the course of ITV’s Love Island, ‘what is Area 51?’, and ‘what is pansexual?’
However, the number one most searched question here was ‘what is the backstop?’, with ‘what is Brexit?’ also making an appearance on the 2019 list, believe it or not. The nation also turned to Google to try and figure out ‘what is a boomer?’ and ‘what is TikTok?’
When it came to movies, Joker topped the list, followed by The Irishman and Avengers Endgame. Other movie searches included The Favourite, Hustlers, and Midsommar.
- Boil an egg
- Vote
- Pronounce ‘psalm’
- Lose belly fat
- Solve a Rubix cube
- Make French toast
- Stop snoring
- Draw
- Make iced coffee
- Get rid of spots
- The backstop
- Area 51
- A ‘dead ting’
- Fracking
- Brexit
- A boomer
- TikTok
- Lupus
- A life sentence in Ireland
- Pansexual