Shirt a Phobia

Sample Page

The SearXNG results page with “wikipedia” as the search term

SearXNG is a metasearch engine forked from the discontinued searX. It is free and open-source, and similar to searX, does not collect information about users.[1]

Instances

SearXNG is server-side software, and as such is hosted by several instances, public and private. Private instances are hosted on a local network, or run on the user’s desktop computer itself, and are designed to be used by one person or a small number of people. Public instances are hosted on public web servers and are designed to be used by anyone like a typical search engine.[2] A list of public instances is available at searx.space.[3]

Features

Categorical searching

SearXNG can separate results into multiple categories, including the standard categories of “Web, “Images,” “Videos,” and “News,” as well as the non-standard categories of “Social Media,” “Music,” “Files,” “IT,” and “Science.”[4]

Engines

As a metasearch engine, SearXNG functions by sending queries to upstream search engines and returning them to the user. As of 2023, more than 70 different search engines are supported, including Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, and Qwant.[2][3] As of 2026, SearXNG lists 251 possible search services to search from.[5] SearXNG also supports “bangs”, searching only a particular engine if an exclamation point and shortcut key are appended before the search. Using two exclamation marks, such as “!!w”, functions like DuckDuckGo‘s version of bangs, redirecting to the external engine itself.[6]

Privacy

SearXNG removes private data from requests sent to search services. SearXNG itself stores little to no information that can be used to identify users.[1][2] SearXNG is also based outside of the U.S.[7]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b Morante, Gabriel (May 2022). “Own Yourself”. Writing Waves. 5 (19). California State University Monterey Bay: 19.
  2. ^ a b c Dávila, Anthony Bryan Encalada (2023). Implementación De Un Prototipo De Buscador Web Basado En Linux Para Garantizar La Privacidad de Los Datos Del Usuario [Implementation of a Prototype Linux-Based Web Search Engine to Guarantee the Privacy of User Information] (PDF) (Bachelor Thesis) (in Spanish). Escuela Politécnica Nacional. p. 3. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2024-09-13.
  3. ^ a b Braeuning, Paul (2023-10-18). Bachelor Thesis for obtaining the academic degree Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) in Computer Science at the Faculty Informatik und Medien (PDF). Leipzig, Saxony: Leipzig University of Applied Sciences. p. 1. Archived from the original on 2024-07-03.
  4. ^ Conway, Adam (2024-06-12). “Should you use a different search engine? You’re missing out on metasearch engines”. XDA. Retrieved 2024-06-22.
  5. ^ “Welcome to SearXNG — SearXNG Documentation (2026.5.2+aefc3c316)”. docs.searxng.org. Retrieved 2026-05-04.
  6. ^ “SearXNG Documentation (2025.2.9+a1e2b2546)”. Search syntax. Retrieved 2025-02-11.
  7. ^ Blue, Violet (March 21, 2025). “How to Avoid US-Based Digital Services—and Why You Might Want To”. Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Retrieved 2026-05-04.