In September 2021, China’s second-largest search engine operator Sogou Inc announced the completion of its merger with Tencent, becoming an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Tencent. After joining Tencent, many of Sogou's businesses and projects were gradually abandoned by Tencent. The mobile APP of Sogou recently announced its shutdown, only the web-based search engine was still in service.  

In January 2022, the Sogou Search APP had already released the "APP business adjustment" announcement, which Sogou Search App will be upgraded to 'Bingo APP'. The home page will be closed, and the information content recommendation and reading service will no longer be provided. However, the Bingo APP cannot be found in either Apple AppStore or Xiaomi Appstore. Until August 12, the Sogou Search APP announced its ceased service. From now on, Sogou's search engine service can only be used on the web page. 

Except for Sogou Search App, other Sogou products are facing a similar fate. The personalized information product Kandian, were also officially ceased operations this year. Sogou Map is the earliest web map for public service in China, with a history dating back to 1999. Since November 2021, Sogou Map has been unavailable on App stores. 

After Sogou's merger with Tencent, the pace of Sogou's product suspensions has accelerated significantly. Tencent removes Sogou's businesses which are duplicated and not profitable under Tencent's platform and content group. Through the business closures, Tencent may have more energy to focus on the development of key products and implement cost optimization for long-term development.

Sogou has been on a continuous downtrend in recent years. Baidu controlled about 70% of China's online search market, while Sogou came second with just 17% market share. In 2021 Q2, Sogou's total revenue was $140 million, down 44% year-over-year. Sogou's core products are facing the pressure of substitution from the market. For example, Sogou Pinyin and Sogou Brower are facing the threat of substitutes from QQ Pinyin and QQ Brower developed by Tencent.

At the same time, the search engine market is still expanding. According to research, the search engine user scale has reached 795 million, and the search engine market size in 2022 is expected to exceed CNY 89.534 billion.

In recent years, Baidu has put its efforts into developing the mobile Baidu App, combining mobile search and content recommendations to seek further improvement in user activity. The number of monthly active users of the Baidu App reached 558 million in March 2021, accounting for more than 75% of daily login users. As early as 2017, ByteDance had established a search department. In August 2019, ByteDance announced the search service's launch and began testing the Toutiao search App in February 2020.

The number of search engine users in China is still growing, along with overall Chinese internet usage. Tech giants are seeking to gain a foothold in this rapidly growing digital economy.