Ivory Search vs Relevanssi
Updated 13 Oct 2026. 18 features compared side by side.
Free WordPress search form builder with unlimited custom forms, AJAX live search, synonyms and highlighting; premium adds SKU and variation search.
Free relevance-based search replacement for WordPress with custom field indexing, synonyms and search logs; Premium adds document search and pinning.
Choose Ivory Search if…
- Sites that need several targeted search forms and live search on a small budget
Choose Relevanssi if…
- You need relevance weighting and PDF & document search
- You also want did you mean? suggestions and multisite search
- You want the more complete feature set (82/100 vs 61/100)
Relevanssi has 4 that Ivory Search lacks, including Relevance weighting, PDF & document search and Did you mean? suggestions. Both include 13 of the 18 features we track.
At a glance
Feature comparison
Click a screenshot to see both plugins side by side.
Ivory Search RelevanssiRelevance & indexing5/77/7
Results can be ordered by date, relevance and other fields, but there are no weights.
Free weights titles, content, comments and tags; Premium adds any post type or taxonomy.
Free forms can search custom fields and metadata; excluding by field needs Pro.
Free version indexes all or selected custom fields.
Searches category and taxonomy term titles and descriptions; restrict by terms.
Indexes categories, tags and custom taxonomies; term pages as results need Premium.
Attachments searched by title, caption and description only, not file content.
Text-based PDFs, Office, ODT, RTF and ePub via an external extraction service; no OCR.
Fuzzy option matches whole or partial words; no typo tolerance described.
Matches partial words when full words fail; typos handled only via 'Did you mean?'.
Free synonym list; keyword stemming requires Pro Plus.
Synonym settings in the free version; Premium adds English stemming.
Exclude post types, specific items, terms and dates free; more exclusions in premium.
Choose indexed post types and exclude posts or categories; pinning results needs Premium.
WooCommerce2/22/2
Free searches products; SKU search and out-of-stock exclusion need Pro Plus.
SKUs and product fields searchable after adding them to the index; no product-specific UI.
Product variation search is a premium feature alongside SKU search.
Variations can be indexed or folded into the parent with a snippet; setup is manual.
Search experience4/55/5
Any form, including the default one, can show AJAX results.
Free official Relevanssi Live Ajax Search plugin adds as-you-type results.
Admins restrict forms by taxonomy, fields or dates; no visitor-facing facets.
Searchform shortcode adds taxonomy dropdowns/checkboxes; faceting relies on FacetWP or similar.
Unlimited forms, each with separate settings and placement.
Searchform shortcode limits each form to post types or categories.
Option to highlight search terms in results.
Highlights terms in custom excerpts and on the destination page.
No spelling suggestion feature in the plugin or documentation.
Suggestions based on successful searches, plus a block; Premium improves spelling correction.
Insights & scale2/43/4
Sends searches to Google Analytics; no built-in report in WordPress.
Logs queries, shows popular searches and recent searches with no hits.
Uses its own local index in the WordPress database.
Index is stored in the WordPress database; no hosted option.
Integrates with WPML, Polylang and Weglot.
Supports WPML and Polylang in the free version.
No cross-site network search mentioned in features or docs.
Free works per site on multisite; cross-site searching needs Premium.
Statuses: Yes Pro Add-on Partial 3rd-party No ?
Pricing compared
Ivory Search Freemium
| Free | $0 |
|---|---|
| Starter | Free per year, Unlimited |
| Pro | $19.99 per year, 1 site |
| Pro Plus | $49.99 per year, 1 site |
Relevanssi Freemium
| Free | $0 |
|---|---|
| Free | Free per year, Unlimited |
| Premium Annual | €120 per year, Unlimited |
| Premium Permanent | €402 lifetime, Unlimited |
Downloads trend
Ivory Search
13,202 downloads last week
Relevanssi
113,135 downloads last week
Verdict
Relevanssi scores higher on our feature checklist (82/100 against 61/100) and includes relevance weighting, PDF & document search and did you mean? suggestions that Ivory Search does not. Check the features you rely on in the table below before deciding.
Biggest differences
Ivory Search: not included. Relevanssi: included. Free weights titles, content, comments and tags; Premium adds any post type or taxonomy.
Ivory Search: not included. Relevanssi: paid version (Premium). Text-based PDFs, Office, ODT, RTF and ePub via an external extraction service; no OCR.
Ivory Search: not included. Relevanssi: included. Suggestions based on successful searches, plus a block; Premium improves spelling correction.
Ivory Search: not included. Relevanssi: paid version (Premium). Free works per site on multisite; cross-site searching needs Premium.
Written from the feature, pricing and install data on this page, not from hands-on testing. How we compare.
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FAQ
Which is better, Ivory Search or Relevanssi?
Relevanssi scores higher on our feature checklist (82/100 against 61/100) and includes relevance weighting, PDF & document search and did you mean? suggestions that Ivory Search does not. Check the features you rely on in the table below before deciding.
Which has more features?
Relevanssi includes 17 of the 18 features we track, against 13 for Ivory Search. Feature count is only part of the picture; check which of the differences matter to you.
Is Ivory Search free?
Ivory Search has a free version on WordPress.org. Paid plans start at $19.99/yr.
Is Relevanssi free?
Relevanssi has a free version on WordPress.org. Paid plans start at €120/yr.
Feature data last changed 13 Oct 2026. Spotted something wrong? Suggest an edit to Ivory Search or Relevanssi. Some links are affiliate links. We may earn a commission at no cost to you; it never affects our data or rankings.