For a few years now I have been singing the praises of free stuff that can be downloaded off the Internet. One of my most used utilities, free or otherwise, that I have downloaded has been WebFerret, a free Internet search utility that automatically searches several search engines each time, one after the other. What could be better? A metasearch utility that searches several search engines at the same time, not just one after the other. Enter Copernic 99. Copernic 99 can search up to 30+ search engines at the same time! There’s a maximum of 300 search results per engine and a maximum of 1000 results per query.

With Copernic 99 you don’t need to learn which search engine is the correct engine to use, nor do you have to learn the different rules for each search engine. Copernic 99 does all that for you utilizing the best search engine for that specific search. Copernic 99 doesn't just find the information you’re looking for; it also stores the results on your PC for offline browsing, organizing them by a relevancy score that’s easy to understand, and removes duplicates automatically. If you continually search for the same info you won’t have to key in the same search over and over again; just click on Update.

Copernic 99 automatically updates its list of search engines and you don’t have to constantly check to see if you have the latest version of the software. When a new upgrade is available, an automatic upgrade button will appear on your screen. Just click that button and Copernic 99 takes care of the rest.

It really is easy to use. Just choose your field of interest (category), i.e., web, newsgroups, email addresses, enter your keyword(s) for the search and click the Search button. All engines of a selected category can be contacted simultaneously, up to 32, and the speed is mainly limited by your computer's capabilities and your Internet connection. (On my Time Warner’s RoadRunner service it flies!) Copernic 99 will know which search engines are best suited for your query, such as DejaNews, AltaVista, HotBot, Excite, Lycos, Infoseek, WebCrawler, Yahoo and Magellan. One feature that I really like is that it automatically highlights your keyword(s). It can display your search results in a summary report format in your default browser, remove dead links and download your results to disk for later viewing (up to 32 simultaneous transfers). Another feature is exporting and saving search results in various file formats (HTML, XML, TXT and DBF). You can also share your results with others by e-mail.

Copernic 99 is a fully-functioning metasearch utility which includes the three most used categories mentioned above, which should be more than enough for the beginner to above average Internet user. But, if you want more fields of interest there’s the commercial version, Copernic 99 Plus, which includes 21 categories, giving you access to some 125 search engines and specific directories. These categories are:

Minimum requirements are: