The short version: AI Search is an enhancement, not a replacement. Traditional keyword results always come first – AI results are added after them. Details below.
No. Traditional results always come first; AI results are added after them. Your search form, results template and URLs stay untouched. Uninstalling restores everything instantly – there is nothing to restore, because nothing was changed.
Yes, exactly as before – they are handled by the traditional pass with top priority. An exact SKU or product-name match is always the first result, and AI suggestions never outrank a direct hit.
AI Search is a WordPress plugin that enhances your existing search with a semantic layer. It understands the meaning and context of a query using vector embeddings, and appends meaning-based matches below the keyword results your search already finds. Enhancement, not replacement.
Default WordPress search only finds literal keyword matches. AI Search keeps those results first – ranked by relevance instead of date – and then adds what keyword matching misses: searching for “summer clothes” also surfaces products described as “lightweight breathable apparel”.
No. The plugin includes a free embedding service with up to 10,000 embeddings per site – no API key required. You can optionally use your own OpenAI key for unlimited indexing.
No. Embeddings are pre-computed in the background when you publish or update content. At search time the comparison runs locally on your server and results are cached.
100+ languages, with cross-lingual matching included – a query in one language can match products described in another. International stores get consistent quality across every language.
Product text is sent once to the EU-based embedding service to generate its embedding; the embedding is then stored in your own database. Search queries are embedded the same way and are not stored externally. No personal user data, passwords or order data is ever transmitted.
It controls how closely a result must match your query to be included in the AI tier (traditional keyword results are unaffected by it). Lower values return more, broader results; higher values return fewer, more precise ones. The default of 30% works well for most stores.
Install and activate the plugin, then follow the 2-minute setup wizard. It detects WooCommerce, pre-selects the most useful product fields, and indexes your catalog. The free service is used by default – no account or API key needed.
Need AI Search customized for your project?
Custom ranking rules, integrations, migrations or a search audit – the plugin’s author takes on a limited number of client projects.
This link takes you to samuelsilva.pt, the personal site of Samuel Silva – AI Search’s developer and the right person for AI search customization on your project.