This table is meant to give you an objective side-by-side comparison of key features in each search engine and is based on each search engine's documentation.
We've strived to provide accurate information below, but if you notice any issues, please open an issue here.
| Typesense | Algolia | ElasticSearch | Meilisearch | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Source Code | Fully open source | Proprietary closed source | Source-available, licensed under SSPL | Fully open source |
| First Commit | 2015 | 2012 | 2010 | 2018 |
| Built Using | C++ | C++ | Java | Rust |
| Core Search Algorithm | Built from the ground-up | Built from the ground-up | Built on top of Lucene | Built from the ground-up |
| Best Suited For | Instant Search-as-you-type Experiences for data sets that can fit in RAM, up to 24 TB (or current commercially available RAM size). | Instant Search-as-you-type Experiences for datasets up to 128 GB in size. | General-purpose search & aggregations over petabyte-scale datasets (eg: log data) | Instant Search-as-you-type Experiences for up to a few hundred thousand records, that don't require a production-grade highly-available setup. |
| Primary Index Location | RAM | RAM | Disk, with RAM cache | Disk with Memory Mapped files |
| Typesense | Algolia | ElasticSearch | Meilisearch | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Self-Hosted Option | ✅️ | ❌ | ✅️ | ✅️ |
| SaaS Option | ✅️ | ✅️ | ✅️ | ❌ |
| High Availability | ✅ RAFT-based multi-node clustering | ✅ RAFT-based multi-node clustering | ✅ Active-passive replication |
❌ Only supports a single-node setup, which creates a potential single point of failure and so is not production-ready. |
| CDN-like Geo-Distributed clusters |
✅ Supported in self-hosted and SaaS options, called Search Delivery Network |
✅ Available in Premium tier, called Distributed Search Network |
❌ Not available as part of hosted offering | ❌ |
| Runtime Dependencies |
None. Self-contained binary. Built-in high performance HTTP server, that can be exposed to the frontend directly. | N/A, since it's SaaS only |
Requires JVM, and an application backend. Cannot be directly exposed to frontend - requires use of nginx, apache or the like as a reverse proxy in front | Recommends use of nginx, apache or the like as a reverse proxy in front, before exposing to frontend |
| Index Backward Compatibility |
✅ Fully backward compatible |
✅ Fully backward compatible |
✅ Fully backward compatible |
❌ Not backward compatible across versions. Version upgrades require re-indexing. |
| Upgrade Path | Replace binary, restart process | Managed SaaS service, doesn't require upgrades | Replace binary, restart process | Replace binary, re-index all documents |
| Typesense | Algolia | ElasticSearch | Meilisearch | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| REST API | ✅️ | ✅️ | ✅️ | ✅️ |
| Typo Tolerance | ✅️ | ✅️ |
✅️ But slow and affects relevance | ✅️ |
|
Query Field Weights & Boosting | ✅️ | ❌ | ✅️ | ❌ |
|
Scoped API Keys & Multi-tenant indices | ✅️ | ✅️ | ❌ | ❌ |
| Federated Multi-Index Search | ✅️ | ✅️ | ✅️ | ❌ |
| Grouping / Distinct | ✅️ |
✅ Upto one distinct field | ✅️ |
✅ Upto one distinct field |
| Dynamic Sorting |
✅ Sort fields can be defined at query time using a single index |
🔶 Duplicate indices need to be created for each sort order, for Exhaustive Sorting. Virtual replica indices can be used for Relevant Sorting. |
✅ Sort fields can be defined at query time using a single index |
✅ Sort fields need to be defined upfront, but can be changed at query time, using a single index. |
| Faceting & Filtering | ✅️ | ✅️ | ✅️ | ✅ |
| Facet Value Searches | ✅️ | ✅️ | ❌ | ❌ |
| Result Pinning / Merchandising | ✅️ |
✅ Upto 10 results in Free Tier, Upto 10,000 results in Premium Tier | ✅️ | ❌ |
| Synonyms | ✅️ | ✅️ Upto 10,000 per index | ✅️ | ✅️ |
| Dynamic Synonym Suggestions | ❌️ | ✅️ Available in Premium Tier | ❌ | ❌ |
| Language support | All languages, expect logographic ones | All languages | All languages | Latin-based languages, English, CJK & Kanji languages |
| Stop words | ❌ | ✅️ | ✅️ | ✅️ |
| Geo Search | ✅ | ✅️ | ✅️ | ❌ |
| Automatic Record ID generation | ✅ | ✅️ | ✅️ | ❌ IDs needs to be pre-generated |
| Sort by String field | ❌ |
✅ But not recommended | ✅️ | ❌ |
| Search Analytics | Client-side, through InstantSearch.js | Client-side and Server-side | ❌ | Client-side, through InstantSearch.js |
| Record Validations | ✅️ | ❌ |
✅ with coerced mapping | ❌ |
| Custom Ranking Rules |
✅ Upto 3 fields | ✅️ | ✅️ | ✅️ |
|
Negative Keyword Search ( -query)
| ✅️ | ✅️ | ✅️ | ❌ |
|
Phrase Search ( "some query")
| ❌ | ✅️ | ✅️ | ✅ |
| User-level Search Personalization | ❌ |
✅ Premium Tier | ❌ | ❌ |
| Collection Aliases | ✅️ | ❌ | ✅️ | ❌ |
| A/B Testing Results | ❌ |
✅ Premium Tier | ❌ | ❌ |
| Query Suggestions | ❌ | ✅️ | ❌ | ❌ |
| Visual Dashboard | ✅ In Typesense Cloud | ✅️ | 🔶️ 3rd party plugins | ✅️ Search only |
| Site Crawler |
🔶️ DocSearch crawler for docs sites. |
✅ DocSearch crawler for docs sites. General site crawler is part of Premium Tier. | ❌ |
🔶️ DocSearch crawler for docs sites. |
| Search UI Component Library | ✅ Supports InstantSearch.js | ✅ InstantSearch.js | ✅ Search UI, requires hosted search | ✅ Supports InstantSearch.js |
| Privacy Friendliness |
✅ Does NOT collect usage analytics, personal data, or IP addresses in both Self-Hosted and SaaS options. |
🔶 Collects personal data, usage analytics & IP addresses. |
🔶 Collects personal data, hardware information, RAM used, unique fingerprint ID for licensing. |
🔶 Collects personal data, hardware information, total number of documents, number of document updates & server uptime. Opt-out supported. |
| Typesense | Algolia | ElasticSearch | Meilisearch | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Maximum Indices | No limitation | No limitation | No limitation | No limitation |
| Maximum Index Size | No limitations, only constrained by available RAM | 128 GB | No limitation | 100GB default, can be modified |
| Maximum Words per field | No limitation | No limitation | No limitation | 1000 |
| Maximum Record Size | No limitation | 10KB | No limitation | 2GB |
| Typesense | Algolia | ElasticSearch | Meilisearch | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Channels |
Github issues Public Slack Community Phone Private Slack Paid Prioritized Support |
Github issues Public Slack Community Phone Paid Prioritized Support |
Github issues Public Slack Community Paid Prioritized Support |
Github issues Public Slack Community |
| Expert Onboarding & Training | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ |