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I have used System Settings… —> Desktop & Dock —> Default web browser to change my default web browser to Firefox.

However, wherever I select a word and use the contextual menu "Search With DuckDuckGo", it does not seem to respect this, and insists on opening Safari.app instead.

How can I get Preview.app, Mail.app, and other Apple-supplied applications to use Firefox instead of Safari?

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    That should not be necessary, but have you restarted your computer after changing that setting? Is it only the native programs that are not respecting the new setting?
    – Alper
    Commented Aug 17 at 12:35

2 Answers 2

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The contextual menu item "Search with" is designed to work with Apple Safari only.

  1. If do not want to show it, you can hide the contextual menu item "Search with" by opening System Preferences → Keyboard → Shortcuts → Services → Collapse Internet → Uncheck Checkbox for "Search with"

  2. One solution would be to use Alfred for Mac or create a simple Shortcut in macOS.

  3. In the Shortcut App create a new Shortcut → Add "Search Web" as action. Select DuckDuckGo as Search and Shortcut Input. In the Details tab enable Use as Quick Action« for Finder and Services Menu. Save your Shortcut e.g. with the file name "Open in DuchDuckGo"

  4. Select a word and use your new contextual menu

Create a Shortcut to open DuckDuckGo in the macOS default browser

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  • I'm a huge fan of Alfred, but find its scripting facility inscrutable. Can you give me a few pointers as to how to do this in Alfred? TIA!
    – Jan Steinman
    Commented Aug 22 at 16:40
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    @JanSteinman In Alfred you run my Shortcut example from above. Add a new Workflow → Add a hotkey. In the sidebar choose Automation → Run Shortcut and select your »Open in DuchDuckGo« from the list
    – BINROTH
    Commented Aug 23 at 10:43
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Okay, figured out where the problem was coming from: Safari itself installs a Service that appears on the contextual menu, wherever you can select text. Within Safari, you can set this to fire up DuckDuckGo or a number of other search engines, and send it to Safari.

So, I disabled that in Safari. Now, the "Search With DuckDuckGo" item no longer appears in the contextual menu wherever you can select text.

Now, I'm looking at making an Automator Service to put "Search With DuckDuckGo" back in the menu, but instead of firing up Safari, it fires up the default web browser. I'll edit this and add the results here when I get it working.

It would have been nice if Apple had done it that way!

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