Microsoft’s Bing search engine is still No. 3 in the U.S. search market, but not by much. The Redmond company came in at an even 15 percent of the market in November, just below the 15.1 percent posted by Yahoo for the month, according to the latest data compiled by the comScore Networks research firm

In fact, Microsoft is the only major U.S. search engine to grow its share of the U.S. market over the past year, rising from less than 12 percent a year ago, according to comScore research released at the time.

Of course, Google remains the king of the market, with more than 65 percent in the latest comScore numbers, down a mere percentage point from the same point a year ago.

Meanwhile, Microsoft’s partner in the search market, Yahoo, has fallen from its position of 16.4 percent a year ago, making the overall gain in their combined market share more modest, at 30.1 percent in November, up from 28.2 percent a year earlier.

The other down side for Microsoft is that the company continues to spend far more on its search initiatives than it makes, as reflected in the ongoing losses reported by its Online Services Division. However, those losses are narrowing, coming in at $494 million in the latest quarter, compared with $558 million a year earlier.

Bottom line, it should be very interesting to see where all of these numbers are a year from now.

Sources: Search Engine Land, Business Insider, comScore Networks and Microsoft.

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