Help Center / Content and entries / Content search

Content search

When working with a lot of content in your space, you’ll find that you’ll need to refine the list of content to quickly find what you’re looking for. The search and filter options in the Contentful web app allow you to do this in a variety of ways.

In the Contentful web app, a prefix search is used. It means that the search results match the beginning of the search query. For example, entering "content" returns results like "content type," "content orchestration," or "Contentful" because they start with "content."

You can search entries, media assets or URLs within entries. The basic text option lets you search through all the text fields of your entries, while filters allow you to further refine the results to just the content types you’re interested in.

Basic search

The basic search works best when you generally know the name of the entry you’re looking for. 

search-and-filter-gif

To perform a basic search:

  1. Log in to the Contentful web app.

  2. Go to the Content tab.

  3. Enter your keywords into the search bar. As you type, the results list is automatically updated, while suggestions are displayed as a drop-down in the search bar. 

  4. The search looks through all of the possible text fields in your space.

URL search

You can search for full URLs, partial URLs, and URL components within entries, across all regular text and rich text fields.

To search for URLs or URL components:

  1. Log in to the Contentful web app.

  2. Go to the Content tab.

  3. Enter the URL or URL component you want to find into the search bar. The results list is updated automatically.

For example, given the following URL:

  • https://www.contentful.com/help/content-and-entries/content-search?some_param=some_value

You can search for:

  • Parts of domains, including subdomains and domain names. For example, www, contentful.

  • Partial paths, with or without the leading slash. For example, /content-and-ent, content-search.

  • URL parameters and their values. For example, some_param, some_value, ?some_param=some_value.

NOTE: Embedded URLs in rich text fields are not supported.

Use filters and operators

Apply filters to narrow down your search results to a specific content type or field value. Use operators to further refine the results list. 

NOTE: IS operator returns the results that fully match your search query. MATCH operator returns the results that both fully and partly match your search query. 

To search for entries with a filter: 

  1. Log in to the Contentful web app.

  2. Go to the Content tab.

  3. Click Filter on the right-hand side of the search bar. 

  4. Choose the filter option you’d like to search by from the drop-down list. 

  5. Optional: Change the default operator by clicking on it and selecting the desired option from the drop-down.

  6. Enter the search query or select the desired value as prompted. Your search results are displayed. 

Use multiple filters

To add multiple filters, simply use the method above for as many additional filters as you’d like.

For a more in-depth introduction to using multiple filters, watch the following video:

Sort search results

You can use the Sort by drop-down menu to organize your search results.

To sort your search results:

  1. Log in to the Contentful web app.

  2. Go to the Content tab.

  3. Enter your keywords into the search bar.

  4. Under Sort by, select the sorting option to apply to the search results.

NOTE: The field is set to Relevance by default. When you sort by relevance, entries where search terms appear more frequently and closer together are displayed higher in the results list.

Sort by drop-down for search

Multi-Content type selector search

The multi-content type search functionality allows you to filter content by multiple content types, simplifying searches for items belonging to any of the selected content types.

To choose multiple content type selector in the search bar:

  1. Log in to the Contentful web app.

  2. Go to the Content tab.

  3. In the search bar, click the Content type filter. By default, it is set to Any.

  4. Select the intended content types from the drop-down menu. To see your results populate in the content table, you can choose from multiple options:

    • After 1.2 seconds of inactivity of completing the last selection from the list, your search request will be triggered.

    • Make your selections from list, press Enter or click outside of the drop-down will submit your search request.

  5. Your search results are displayed in the content table.

Upon making your selections, they remain in the same place in your drop-down list. However, once you exit the drop-down pop-up and return back, the selections you made are moved to the top of the list. 

Multi-content type selecter update


Optional: You can save multi-content type search selections. Find your saved searches  in the content sidebar under “Saved views.”  

To remove the content type selections, click Clear in the drop-down menu. 

NOTE: To reset your selections, open the drop-down, uncheck your selections or click Reset to Any.

Tips to optimize search

To obtain more precise search results or increase their number, try the following:

  • Wrap your query in quotes to match an exact phrase. For example, the query "my cat is blue" returns the entries that contain this exact sequence.

  • Use the MATCH operator — the MATCH operator returns the results that match the search query not fully, but partly. This means the search results include matches for any of the words in your query or the beginning of those words. For example, the query "content type" used with the MATCH operator returns all the entries that contain "content" and "content type".

  • Avoid searching fields with a limited value set (e.g., number ranges 0 - 5, booleans, etc.) on content types with large numbers of entries.

Searching assets

Searching assets works the same as searching entries: the only difference is that there are filters that apply only to assets. These are:

  • Width

  • Height

  • Type

  • Size

  • File name

Notes:

  • Width and Height must be entered as whole numbers only (e.g., use 500 and not 500px).

  • Size must be entered as a whole number only (for example, 100000 not 100k).

To search your media assets:

  1. Log in to the Contentful web app.

  2. Go to the Media tab.

  3. Optional: Click Filter on the right-hand side of the search bar. Choose the filter option you’d like to search by from the drop-down list. 

  4. Optional: Change the default operator by clicking on it and selecting the desired option from the drop-down.

  5. Enter the search query or select the desired value as prompted. Your search results are displayed. 

Quick search

Content search quick search

To perform a quick search:

  1. Log in to the Contentful web app.

  2. Press the / key anywhere in the web app to open the quick search dialog.

  3. Enter your desired search terms. The search will go through all content types, entries, and assets in your space.

Download content search results as CSV

Content search export as csv

The CSV format enables you to extract customized search results and analyze that data in a BI tool of your choice. 

Export your Contentful web app content search results in the form of a CSV file for reporting. For example, analyzing metadata to improve SEO performance, archiving candidates, or enrichment. 

To export search results as CSV: 

  1. Log in to the Contentful web app.

  2. Go to the Content tab.

  3. Apply the filter to the necessary columns in the table.  

  4. Select the rows to export by checking the box on the left side.  

  5. Click Export to CSV at the top of the search results table to download.

NOTE: Export as CSV works on a per-page basis. The number of search results you can download is limited to one page for each CSV file.