Mullvad Set to Retire 'Leta' Search Proxy on Nov. 27, 2025

The Mullvad Leta search engine will be retired at the end of this month, according to an announcement from Mullvad last week. Their announcement cites changes in the search industry that they feel Leta would not be able to keep up with, stating that their search proxy "will likely become less useful over time."

Leta was useful as a proxy to major search engines like Google and Brave. Queries to those search engine providers would be pooled from Mullvad, to reduce the chances of a search engine being able to tie a query to a particular user.

Mullvad says that similar privacy can be achieved by accessing those search engines directly through the use of a private web browser and a VPN.

This change makes sense as Mullvad appears to be refocusing on improving their core VPN product. They recently announced "Lightweight WireGuard Obfuscation" to help more users bypass firewalls and censorship, in addition to QUIC obfuscation added in September, as well as their announcement that they are deprecating OpenVPN at the beginning of 2026.

Mullvad Leta users seeking an alternative could consider following Mullvad's advice and using Google alongside Mullvad Browser and their VPN, or switching to an alternative recommended by Privacy Guides:

Recommended Search Engines: Anonymous Alternatives to Google - Privacy Guides

Use privacy-respecting search engines which don’t build an advertising profile based on your searches.

Privacy Guides