About this plugin
WPRAG Smart Search adds a block-first search experience to WordPress. It ships a Gutenberg search block with live results and automatic taxonomy filter facets, all running locally on your own WordPress database with zero external calls and no account required.
How it works
The plugin builds a local inverted index with weighted relevance scoring, so a match in a higher-weighted zone (for example the title) can count for more than a match in the body, and it surfaces taxonomy facets automatically based on the current result set. Until you build the index, it falls back to a weighted WP_Query search, so search works the moment you activate the plugin.
Features
- Gutenberg search block ( WPRAG Search ) with live results, inspector controls, and full block-styling support (colors, spacing, typography).
- Weighted relevance scoring — configurable per-zone weights (title, content, excerpt, taxonomy, custom fields, author, comments).
- Local inverted index with optional English stemming, built and stored entirely in your own database.
- Taxonomy filter facets — an automatic sidebar of category, tag, and custom-taxonomy filters derived from the current result set.
- Live AJAX results — results render without a page reload.
- Post-type and exclusion controls — choose which post types are searchable and exclude specific post IDs.
- Rate-limited REST API — the public /wp-json/wprag-search/v1/search endpoint is capped at 60 requests per minute per IP.
- WordPress.org compliant — no external HTTP calls, no tracking, no account.
- Translation-ready — single text domain, full internationalization.
Privacy
This plugin makes no external HTTP requests. All search runs locally against your WordPress database. It does not transmit visitor data off your site, and it bundles no analytics, tracking pixels, or affiliate links.
You can verify this with any network inspector or server-side HTTP monitor.
Want AI-powered semantic search?
ai) is a separate managed service that provides AI-powered semantic search — search that understands meaning, not just keywords, and can generate answers from your content. This free plugin does not require WPRAG and has no connection to the service. If your site grows beyond what keyword search can handle (support docs, knowledge bases, large content libraries), the plugin’s Upgrade tab explains the difference and how to get started.
If you install the paid WPRAG Connector, this free plugin automatically stands down so there are no duplicate menus or blocks.
Development
This plugin ships its complete, unminified source. The compiled files in dist/ are generated from the source in src/ (including the shared core in src/shared/ ) with webpack. js — is bundled in the plugin, with no external repository required.
To regenerate the compiled assets from the plugin itself:
- npm install
- npm run build