As 2024 draws to a close, it leaves behind a series of impactful and memorable news stories that defined the year. When looking for information on top news stories, many people around the world turned to Google, the search engine owned by Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL), where they searched for athletes, celebrities, politicians and coverage of the 2024 U.S. presidential election.

Here’s a look at the top 10 most searched-for items worldwide on Google in 2024:

1. Copa América
2. UEFA European Championship
3. ICC Men's T20 World Cup
4. India vs England
5. Liam Payne
6. Donald Trump
7. India vs Bangladesh
8. iPhone 16
9. Olympics
10. Catherine, Princess of Wales

In the United States, the top 10 most searched items were:

1. Election
2. Donald Trump
3. Connections
4. New York Yankees
5. Kamala Harris
6. Copa America
7. Hurricane Milton tracker
8. Olympics medal count
9. Toby Keith
10. Liam Payne

Here are the top 10 most searched news items worldwide in 2024:

1. U.S. Election
2. Excessive heat
3. Olympics
4. Hurricane Milton
5. Typhoon No. 10
6. Iran Rafah
7. CrowdStrike
8. Trump shot
9. Menendez brothers
10. Monkeypox

Several sporting events dominated the worldwide searches in 2024, with soccer and cricket events being the top searched items. The Copa América was hosted by the United States, which likely led to increased American interest in the event, which featured North American and South American soccer teams. The United States men's soccer team failed to advance past the group stage with Argentina winning the championship.

The Men's T20 World Cup was co-hosted by the West Indies and the United States in June 2024. The event was the first major ICC tournament to have matches played in the United States.

On the business side of things, the iPhone 16 from Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) was the eighth most-searched item in 2024, a signal of global demand for the smartphone.

CrowdStrike Holdings (NASDAQ:CRWD), which suffered a large IT outage was one of the most-searched news items in 2024.

Several Olympic athletes and themes were among the most-searched items in 2024 globally and in the United States. Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ:CMCSA) had the media rights to the Olympics in the United States.

The Menendez brothers also saw strong interest among news searches, which may have been helped by a Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX) true crime documentary film that put their case back into the national and global spotlight.

Read Also: Top 10 Google Searches For Events, People In 2023: War In Israel, Titanic Sub, Hurricanes, Shootings, Damar Hamlin, Travis Kelce And More Of Big Interest Around The World

Politicians, Athletes Dominate Top People Searches: Google also reveals the year’s most-searched individuals and notable passings that captured public interest.

Here are the top 10 most-searched-for people on Google globally in 2024:

1. Donald Trump
2. Catherine, Princess of Wales
3. Kamala Harris
4. Imane Khelif
5. Joe Biden
6. Mike Tyson
7. JD Vance
8. Lamine Yamal
9. Simone Biles
10. Diddy

These were the most-searched-for passings in 2024:

1. Liam Payne
2. Toby Keith
3. O.J. Simpson
4. Shannon Doherty
5. Akira Toriyama
6. Ratan Tata
7. Alain Delon
8. Maggie Smith
9. James Earl Jones
10. Silvio Santos

Among searches for people, the 2024 U.S. presidential election was top of mind with Trump, Harris, Biden and Vance all ranking in the top 10. President Biden dropped out of the election, paving way for a head-to-head matchup between Trump and Harris with Vance selected as Trump's vice-presidential pick.

Payne, a former member of the band One Direction, passed away in Argentina in October at the age of 31. The singer was one of the most-searched for overall items, news stories, people and passings.

Read Next:

• Most Visited Wikipedia Pages In 2024: Trump, Harris, Musk, Swift, Politics And Netflix Dominate List

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