SearX vs Tantivy
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted search engines options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
SearX
The original privacy-respecting metasearch engine
VS
Tantivy
Full-text search engine library written in Rust
| Feature | SearX | Tantivy |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Search Engines | Search Engines |
| License | AGPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Language | Python | Rust |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Hard |
| Min. RAM | 256 MB | 128 MB |
| Deployment | docker, bare-metal | source, binary |
| GitHub stars | ★ 13,532 | ★ 15,656 |
| First released | 2014 | 2016 |
| Replaces | Google Search, Bing | Elasticsearch |
Why pick each one
Frequently asked questions
Is SearX or Tantivy better?
Neither is universally better. Tantivy has the larger community, while SearX is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are SearX and Tantivy free and open-source?
Yes. SearX is licensed under AGPL-3.0 and Tantivy under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run SearX and Tantivy with Docker?
SearX: yes. Tantivy: check the project docs for container support.