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Google, an American multinational technology company that specialises in Internet-related services and products, yesterday released top searched results by Kenyans in the past 15 years, revealing that Kenyans’ love for football has remained consistent over the review period.

According to the results, ranked in order by volume of searches show that many kenyan’s closely follow the English Premier League and the Fantasy Premier League, making them the first and the fifth top most searched items in the general category.

Other football searches include Champions League, Europa League, La Liga and Serie A.

Local soccer giants Gor Mahia, AFC Leopards, and Harambee Stars also made it to the top ten list in the sports category.

“English Premier League was the most searched in the general category followed by SportPesa, a betting company started in 2013,” says Google.

Kenya has the highest number of gambling youth in Sub-Saharan Africa and sports betting has become the most popular form of gambling, according to GeoPoll’s series of studies that looked at the rise of sports betting in Africa.

The data further reveals that Betin Kenya, another betting company, is the third most searched item in the general category.

General category

Online commerce platforms Jumia Kenya and Jiji Kenya emerged fourth and eighth on the list of top most searched items in the general category respectively.

Jumia Kenya is an online marketplace that started in 2013 while Jiji is an online classifieds platform that enables clients to design, manage, and share their advertisements and interact with the buyer or seller through an easy messaging system.

Fifth on the list is Brighter Monday, a job website founded in Kenya in 2006. It is followed by Fantasy Premier League at the sixth position while Kenya Power emerged as the seventh most searched item over the past 15 years in the general category.

The Kenya Law Reports and the December Global Holidays closed the list of the top searched items in the general category over the last 15 years at numbers nine and ten respectively. 

Kenya Law Reports is a major resource for lower courts to the Supreme Court timetables. The website contains past judgements that are regularly used as authorities in ongoing cases.

The data also shows President Uhuru Kenyatta, former Prime Minister Raila Odinga, Deputy President William Ruto and lawyer-activist Miguna Miguna topped local people searches in the past 15 years, in a list that also involved former Nairobi governor Mike Sonko, and Embakasi South MP Babu Owino.

Kenyatta University, University of Nairobi (UoN), and Moi University emerged as the most searched after institutions followed by Maseno and Mount Kenya Universities.

In the global personalities category, American model Kim Kardashian, Trinidadian rapper Nicki Minaj, US rapper Lil Wayne, Tele-evangelist Joel Osteen and late Fast and Furious actor Paul Walker attracted the highest searches over the past 15 years, while tennis star Serena Williams, founder of Microsoft Bill Gates, global music icon Celine Dion, golf legend Tiger Woods and Canadian actress Nina Dobrev made it to the top ten list.

In the music category, Tanzania’s Diamond Platnumz led, closely followed by Canadian rapper Nicki Minaj, Tanzanian gospel artist Rose Muhando, Kenya’s Willy Paul, and Jamaican recording artist Vybz Kartel. Puerto Rican singer Luis Fonsi’s hit song Despacito attracted the highest searches for its lyrics over the past 15 years followed by Ed Sheraan’s Perfect, Amazing Grace by Diana Ross, Hallelujah, All of Me by John Legend, What a Friend we have in Jesus and Tanzanian Harmonize’s hit song Kwangwaru.

Google Trends is a publicly available tool that displays relative search volume across geographies, time periods and queries that people want to know about.

The trends let you dive deep into what’s popular on the Internet. You can compare Search data by time, location, and between queries.

It also offers category filtering, top and rising searches, and geographic and “heat maps”. The trends are celebrating their 15th Anniversary in Kenya.