| name | crw-search |
| description | Search the web with fastCRW and get titles, URLs, and descriptions.
Use when you have a question or topic but not a URL — "search for",
"find pages about", "look up", "what is", "who is", "latest news on",
"find docs for". Own search backend: self-hosted, no API key, no per-query
cost, high recall via meta-search aggregation. Step 1 of the crw
workflow ladder.
|
| license | AGPL-3.0 |
| metadata | {"author":"us","version":"0.3.0","homepage":"https://fastcrw.com","repository":"https://github.com/us/crw"} |
| allowed-tools | Bash(crw:*) Bash(curl:*) Read |
crw-search — web search via crw's own search backend
When to use
- You have a question or topic, not a URL. Get candidate URLs first, then
scrape the one that looks right.
- Step 1 in the crw ladder: most searches should end at
step 2 (crw-scrape) — pick the best result URL
and scrape it for full content.
- Token-heavy context? Pipe through a subprocess filter instead of dumping
raw JSON. See crw-dynamic-search.
- The search backend is self-hosted and free — no API key, no per-query billing,
no usage cap. Queries never leave your infrastructure in embedded/local mode.
Quick start
CLI (binary on PATH):
crw search "rust async http client"
crw search "site:docs.rs tokio" --json --fields title,url,snippet --limit 5
crw search "CVE-2024-1234" --category news --time-range week
crw search "climate policy 2025" --json -o .crw/results.json
crw search "rust crates" --language en --limit 20
MCP (inside an agent harness):
crw_search(query="rust async http client", limit=5, lang="en")
crw_search(query="latest CVE nginx", tbs="qdr:w", categories="news")
crw_search(query="openai pricing", scrapeOptions={"formats": ["markdown"]})
REST (drop-in for Firecrawl SDKs — just swap the base URL):
curl -X POST "$CRW_API_URL/v1/search" -H "Authorization: Bearer $CRW_API_KEY" \
-H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
-d '{"query":"rust async http","limit":5,"lang":"en"}'
Options
| Need | CLI flag | MCP / REST field |
|---|
| Result count | -l/--limit N (default 10) | limit (default 5) |
| JSON output | --json or --format json | — (always JSON) |
| Field projection | --fields title,url,snippet | — |
| Output to file | -o FILE | — |
| Filter by category | --category news|images|videos|general|… | categories |
| Language | --language en | lang |
| Time filter | --time-range day|week|month|year | tbs: qdr:h|qdr:d|qdr:w|qdr:m|qdr:y |
| Safe search | --safesearch 0|1|2 | — |
| Custom search backend | --searxng-url URL / $CRW_SEARXNG_URL | — |
| Group by source | — | sources: ["web","news","images"] |
| Scrape results inline | — (use crw scrape separately) | scrapeOptions: {formats:["markdown"]} |
--fields available values: title, url, description, snippet,
position, score, category. snippet is an alias for description.
A note on result scores
The search backend is a meta-search aggregator — it merges results from
multiple engines (Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, etc.) and the score field
reflects internal engine weighting, not a universal relevance measure. Do not
rely on score for ranking or filtering. Use position (1-based rank) or
result order instead — position 1 is the most relevant result surfaced.
Tips
- No results / 403? The search backend needs JSON output enabled in its
config. Run
crw setup --local to spin up a pre-configured sidecar
automatically. Public instances usually block JSON with 403/429.
--fields saves context. --json --fields title,url,snippet --limit 5
is one call; piping to jq is two. Prefer the flag.- Inline scraping via MCP. Pass
scrapeOptions: {formats: ["markdown"]}
to get page content alongside search results in one round-trip. There is no
--scrape CLI flag — use the MCP/REST path for this.
- Time-sensitive queries. Use
--time-range week (CLI) or tbs: "qdr:w"
(MCP/REST) for news, CVEs, releases, or any freshness-sensitive topic.
- After search, scrape the winner.
crw search "…" returns candidates;
crw scrape "<url>" gets the full content. Don't try to read content from
search snippets alone.
- Write large result sets to
.crw/. Never stream a 20-result JSON blob
to stdout into context. Use -o .crw/results.json then jq/grep.
See also
- crw-scrape — scrape the URL you found
- crw-dynamic-search — filter output in a
subprocess to save context (use this on token-heavy tasks)
- crw — hub skill with the full workflow ladder
