That is the conclusion of a new study by analytics company StatCounter, which found that the Microsoft-owned search engine held 8.51 per cent of the US market during September - a decrease on the 9.64 per cent recorded the previous month.

 

On a global scale, Bing saw a slight decline from 3.58 per cent to 3.25 per cent, while rival Yahoo! experienced a drop from 4.84 per cent to 4.37 per cent.

 

In the US, Yahoo!'s proportion of the market dipped to 9.4 per cent, down from 10.5 per cent the previous month.

 

Google continued to dominate during September - recording 90.54 per cent of the global search sector and 80.08 per cent in the US.

 

Chief executive officer of StatCounter Aodhan Cullen said there has been a decrease in Bing's traffic since mid-August, adding: "The wheels haven't fallen off but the underlying trend must be a little worrying for Microsoft."

 

Last month, Microsoft announced a visual search feature for Bing that will allow users to browse through results using pictures as well as words.