A plugin for integrating MeiliSearch with NodeBB (This plugin is inspired and refactored from the original nodebb-plugin-meilisearch)
Make sure to disable nodebb-plugin-dbsearch when using this plugin.
Required existing Meilisearch instance. Set your URL and API Key in the ACP
- Refactored for NodeBB 4.14 up.
- Updated to Meilisearch JS API 0.59.
- ACP panel comply to NodeBB standard.
- Reindex / Force reindex all working as expected
- Composer suggestion optimization.
- Bug fixes from existing plugin.
- Chat search support
- Global chat search support (will auto detect and override
nodebb-plugin-chat-search) - Federated (ActivityPub) content support: remote posts, topics, and chat messages are indexed and searchable like local content. In-topic federated posts only available in version 4.16.4+
- Semantic / hybrid (AI) search via Meilisearch embedders, configurable from the ACP (OpenAI, Hugging Face, Ollama, or a custom REST embedding endpoint). Requires a Meilisearch instance with embedder support (v1.13+).
Composer suggestions
Global search
ACP
Federation notes
Remote (federated) content is handled transparently:
- Remote posts carry URL-shaped pids, which Meilisearch rejects as primary keys — they are indexed under a reversible codec form (
apm_+ base64url) and decoded back to real pids on every search path (same mechanism the chat index already used for federated mids). - Remote topics get locally-generated UUID tids, which are valid Meilisearch identifiers — no codec needed; they are filterable, so normal search and
postedByfiltering work for federated users. - Remote categories carry URL cids (
categoryRemote:<url>); category filters emit them as quoted string literals, so searching within a remote category scopes correctly. Unclassified remote content lives in the world pseudo-category (cid −1) and matches the bare numeric filter. - The reindex iterates the local and remote zsets (
posts:pid/postsRemote:pid,topics:tid/topicsRemote:tid) as one merged loop per type, with progress totals covering both. - After deploying onto a forum that already has federated content, run one force reindex to backfill remote documents.