My search engine on my Brave browser does not work, it is fine on Opera, anyone help?

If your search engine isn’t working in Brave but works in Opera, the problem is with Brave’s setup, not the search engine itself.

 

Here are the steps you can try:

1. Check your default search engine in Brave

• Go to Settings → Search engine.

• Make sure your preferred search engine (Google, DuckDuckGo, Bing, etc.) is selected.

• Try switching to another search engine to test.

2. Clear cache/cookies for the search engine

• Settings → Privacy and security → Clear browsing data.

• Select Cookies and cached images/files (not passwords/history unless you want to).

• Restart Brave.

3. Disable Shields/Extensions temporarily

• Brave’s ad/tracker blocking (Shields) sometimes interferes.

• Click the Brave lion icon → turn Shields off for the search engine page.

• Also try disabling extensions (go to brave://extensions/) and test.

4. Update Brave

• Menu → About Brave → it will auto-check for updates.

• Restart after updating.

5. Reset settings if nothing works

• Settings → Reset settings → Restore settings to their original defaults.

• This fixes corrupted profiles but resets custom settings.

If Opera works fine, it’s not your network or DNS. It’s either Brave Shields, cache, or a broken setting.

15 hours ago, CharlieH said:

If your search engine isn’t working in Brave but works in Opera, the problem is with Brave’s setup, not the search engine itself.

 

Here are the steps you can try:

1. Check your default search engine in Brave

• Go to Settings → Search engine.

• Make sure your preferred search engine (Google, DuckDuckGo, Bing, etc.) is selected.

• Try switching to another search engine to test.

2. Clear cache/cookies for the search engine

• Settings → Privacy and security → Clear browsing data.

• Select Cookies and cached images/files (not passwords/history unless you want to).

• Restart Brave.

3. Disable Shields/Extensions temporarily

• Brave’s ad/tracker blocking (Shields) sometimes interferes.

• Click the Brave lion icon → turn Shields off for the search engine page.

• Also try disabling extensions (go to brave://extensions/) and test.

4. Update Brave

• Menu → About Brave → it will auto-check for updates.

• Restart after updating.

5. Reset settings if nothing works

• Settings → Reset settings → Restore settings to their original defaults.

• This fixes corrupted profiles but resets custom settings.

If Opera works fine, it’s not your network or DNS. It’s either Brave Shields, cache, or a broken setting.

Thanks Charlie, I have tried as much of your advice that I can and still the Brave search engine does not work. I had decided to use Opera but it also has it's problems. When I try to get on to the likes of  YouTube, the wee circle still just goes round and round. So after two or three years I suppose it is back to Chrome. Though I will need Opera for its free VPNs when I stream movies and TV shows.

Brave works fine on my laptop.