Apple’s Siri Drives 25 Percent Of Wolfram|Alpha Queries

Yesterday knowledge engine Wolfram|Alpha announced an intriguing new paid service Wolfram|Alpha Pro. Gary Price wrote an overview of the new service, which will likely appeal to academics, data geeks and a range of other specialized users.

Wolfram|Alpha is by no means a mainstream search engine, yet it has managed to establish something of a beachhead and has a growing fan base. It owes some of that to Apple’s Siri, which chose Wolfram|Alpha as one of two structured data providers that tie directly into the personal assistant. The other is Yelp.

Wolfram|Alpha gets about 3.7 million daily page views and 17.3 visits per month in the US, according to Alexa data the site itself provides when you ask it about its own traffic.

According to an article in the New York Times tied to the Wolfram|Alpha Pro launch, “Siri accounts for about a quarter of the queries fielded by Wolfram Alpha.” However the company receives no branding on those results. Here are some examples of how Siri presents Wolfram|Alpha content:

Apple and Siri’s relationship with Yelp and Wolfram|Alpha are a kind of template for how the personal assistant will likely work with other third party data providers in the future.

About The Author

Greg Sterling

Greg Sterling is a Contributing Editor at Search Engine Land. He researches and writes about the connections between digital and offline commerce. He is also VP of Strategy and Insights for the Local Search Association. Follow him on Twitter or find him at Google+.