Google is still America's number one search engine, a new study has revealed.

Figures released by Nielsen//NetRatings show 49.6 per cent of web searches were carried out on Google during October.

The study claims Americans performed 3.1 billion searches on the website, which saw a year-on-year growth of 23 per cent.

Second in the list was Yahoo!, with its search engine being used 1.4 billion times last month.

Despite having 23.9 per cent of the current market share, Yahoo! was shown to be catching up to Google - the search engine's yearly growth up by 30 per cent compared to the same period last year.

MSN and AOL came third and fourth in the survey, with a market share of 8.8 and 6.2 per cent respectively.

Nielsen//NetRatings claims to be the global standard for measuring internet trends and researching online advertising and user lifestyle information.