About this plugin
Public beta — your feedback shapes the roadmap. Appinio Search is fully functional and safe to run on live stores, but it’s new to the market: you’re among the first shops using it, so expect the occasional rough edge — and please tell us what you find. Report bugs and ideas on GitHub.
Early adopters directly shape what ships next.
Appinio Search connects your WooCommerce store to Appinio AI Search — semantic, typo-tolerant product search that understands what shoppers mean, not just the keywords they type. It also speaks 100+ languages out of the box, including true cross-language search: a query typed in one language finds products described in another.
The plugin does two things:
- Keeps your catalog in sync — every product create, update, stock change, trash, and restore is pushed to Appinio automatically, in real time. A one-click Bulk Sync indexes your entire catalog in background batches.
- Adds AI search to your storefront — drops the <semantic-search> widget onto your store, wired to your existing search box, so shoppers get instant, relevance-ranked results.
The plugin is a thin integration layer: all AI, indexing, embedding, and ranking runs on the Appinio cloud service. You need an Appinio account and an API key to use it.
At a glance
- 100+ languages, true cross-language search — no separate configuration per language.
- Semantic + typo-tolerant — understands meaning and intent, not just exact keywords.
- Real-time sync + one-click Bulk Sync — every change pushed automatically, whole catalog indexed in background batches.
- 17+ product fields mapped — including variable/grouped products, brand, and attributes.
- Managed cloud backend (bge-m3 embeddings), EU-hosted; BYOK (bring your own LLM key) supported.
Features
- Sign up from the plugin — create your Appinio account with an email + one-time code, no dashboard round-trip; your API keys are set up automatically.
- Multilingual & cross-language — 100+ languages out of the box; a query in one language finds products described in another.
- Real-time product sync — create, update, stock change, trash, and restore are all pushed automatically.
- Debounced & reliable — Action Scheduler coalesces WooCommerce’s multiple saves into one API call, so a single edit never triggers duplicate indexing.
- One-click Bulk Sync — index your whole catalog in background batches, with a live progress indicator.
- Rich field mapping — title, description, price, sale/compare-at price, currency, image, stock, SKU, categories, tags, rating, review count, brand, and product attributes.
- Variable & grouped products — the parent is indexed with min/max variation price and aggregated attributes; grouped products include their children.
- AI search widget — the <semantic-search> element, loaded from the Appinio CDN and auto-wired to your store’s search input.
- Light / Dark / Auto appearance — pick a widget theme, or let Auto match your store’s background.
- Category-aware — on category pages the widget scopes results to that category automatically.
- Status guard — only published products are indexed; drafts and trashed products are removed from the index.
- HPOS compatible — declares WooCommerce High-Performance Order Storage compatibility.
Requirements
- WordPress 6.0+
- WooCommerce 8.0+
- PHP 8.1+
- An active Appinio account — sign up at app-in.io.
External services
This plugin relies on the Appinio cloud service to provide AI search. It is not self-hosted.
What is sent and when:
- When a product is created, updated, or its stock changes — and during Bulk Sync — the plugin sends that product’s data (title, description, price, currency, image URL, stock status, SKU, categories, tags, rating, review count, brand, and attributes) to the Appinio API ( https://api.app-in.io ), authenticated with your secret API key. Appinio indexes it for search.
- When a product is trashed or unpublished, the plugin sends a delete request containing the product ID.
- On every storefront page load (once a Public Key is configured), the plugin loads the Appinio search widget JavaScript from https://cdn.app-in.io/v1/search.js. The visitor’s browser fetches this file directly from Appinio’s CDN, which receives standard HTTP request metadata (IP address, user agent, referrer).
- When a shopper searches, the widget sends the query text and your Public Key to the Appinio API, which returns ranked results.
- If you register from within the plugin, your email address, store name, store URL, and admin language are sent to the Appinio API ( https://api.app-in.io ) to create your account and email you a one-time verification code. This happens only when you choose to sign up from the plugin.
No customer personal data is sent — only your store’s product catalog, shoppers’ search queries, and (if you register in-plugin) your own account email.
Terms and privacy:
- Terms of Service: https://app-in.io/terms
- WooCommerce Service Terms (product schedule): https://app-in.io/woocommerce/eula
- Privacy Policy: https://app-in.io/privacy
- Data Processing Agreement (GDPR): https://app-in.io/dpa
Using this plugin means the search widget script runs in visitors’ browsers and product data is transmitted to Appinio. Please update your own site’s privacy notice accordingly.
Support
- Bug reports and feature requests: github.com/app-in-io/appin-woocommerce/issues