Google leads in the European search market with more than 19 billion searches conducted in March - or 79 percent of the market - according to the comScore qSearch 2.0 rankings (via MarketingCharts). No. 3 Yandex of Russia outpaced both Yahoo and Microsoft, the data showed .

Eastern Europe Search Players a Factor

Google's top position was followed by eBay, which accounted for 3.1 percent of European searches. Yandex, a search portal, ranked third with 2.2 percent search market share, slightly ahead of Yahoo Sites at 2.0 percent and Microsoft Sites at 1.9 percent.

Two Polish properties, Nasza-Klasa.pl and QXL Ricardo also proved popular, with 1.3 percent and 1.2 percent shares, respectively.

Another Russian property, Rambler Media, grabbed the No. 10 position with a 0.5 percent share.

"[W]e are seeing key local players show leadership in Eastern Europe, where English is spoken less than in Western markets," said Jack Flanagan, EVP of comScore. "With Russia's online population now the fastest growing in Europe, it is likely that some of these local search engines will continue to gain traction and market share."

Breakdown by Country

In March, 221.2 million Europeans conducted 24.6 billion searches, averaging 111 searches per searcher.

Searchers in Finland exhibited the heaviest search activity with 143 searchers per searcher, followed by Portugal (128 searches per searcher) and the UK (124 searches per searcher).

Finland and Russia, which have a common border, showed the widest disparity in search intensity: Russia, where Yandex led the search market, ranked at the bottom of the list with 78 searches per searcher; Finland, a Google-led search market, ranked at the top.