Bing Webmaster Tools vs Google Search Console

Verdict

Bing Webmaster Tools and Google Search Console are the only authoritative sources of first-party query data for a site's performance on their respective engines, and neither substitutes for the other because they report on different search engines. This is the rare comparison in this directory where the honest answer is "both," not "either" — every verified site should have both connected, since no third-party SEO tool can see Bing's or Google's actual query logs.

Choose Google Search Console if

• Your priority is Google traffic — the overwhelming majority of most sites' organic search.
• You need Core Web Vitals field data, rich-results testing, or manual-action alerts, none of which Bing's tool provides.
• You're troubleshooting indexing issues on Google specifically.

Choose Bing Webmaster Tools if

• You want visibility into Bing's query performance, which also underlies Microsoft Copilot's web results.
• You're auditing a site for a client or market where Bing's share of traffic is unusually high, such as certain enterprise or government audiences on managed Windows devices.
• You want a second, independent keyword research tool based on real query data, at no cost.

What they share

Both are entirely free with no paid tier, require only domain or URL verification to use, and report click-through rate, impressions and average position by query — the closest thing either ecosystem has to ground truth, as opposed to the sampled estimates every paid SEO platform provides. Bing Webmaster Tools can even import existing Search Console data to speed up setup. See how to choose an SEO platform for where these two free tools fit next to the paid suites.

The honest caveat

Because both are free and neither is a work of competitive intelligence, treat this less as a comparison than a checklist: verify your site in both, regardless of which paid platform you ultimately choose for research work.