Ask.com Shuts Down After 25 Years as IAC Pivots Strategy

Quick Facts

• Ask.com officially shut down on May 1, 2026, after 25 years of operation
• IAC acquired the service for $1.85 billion in 2005 but struggled to compete with Google
• The shutdown is part of IAC’s broader restructuring, including a name change to People Incorporated

Ask.com, the search engine formerly known as Ask Jeeves, officially closed on May 1, 2026, ending a 25-year run that began as one of the internet’s pioneering question-and-answer services.

The shutdown comes as parent company IAC undergoes a strategic restructuring. IAC is changing its name to People Incorporated and implementing a consolidation plan targeting $40 million in annual savings while focusing on its People Inc. business and investment in MGM Resorts International.

IAC acquired Ask Jeeves in 2005 for approximately $1.85 billion, rebranding it to Ask.com the following year. The service launched in 1996 by entrepreneurs Garrett Gruener and David Warthen in Berkeley, California, and went public as AskJeeves.com in April 1997.

Ask Jeeves pioneered conversational search, encouraging users to pose questions in natural language rather than keywords. This approach, novel in 1997, predated the conversational AI tools that define today’s search landscape.

IAC Chairman Barry Diller acknowledged the service’s limitations as early as 2010, stating at TechCrunch Disrupt that Ask.com was not competitive with Google and was not valued in IAC’s stock. By 2010, the company had shut down its independent web crawling infrastructure and outsourced core search functions to third-party providers.

The official farewell message read: “After 25 years of answering the world’s questions, Ask.com officially closed on May 1, 2026. We are deeply grateful to the brilliant engineers, designers, and teams who built and supported Ask over the decades.”

While Ask.com claimed more than 100 million users globally in 2012, it remained overshadowed by Google throughout most of its existence. IAC’s Search segment generated revenue through a Google Services Agreement under which Google supplied paid listings to the company’s search operations.

The closure reflects the broader evolution of information discovery online. The search market remains dominated by Google, while newer AI-driven tools compete to become the next default entry point to the web.

Read more: Farewell, Jeeves: Ask.com shuts down