Site Search: Directly Search any Website – Arc Help Center

This article applies to Arc for macOS, but not on Arc for Windows.

What is Site Search?

Site Search allows you to directly search any website from within Arc's Command Bar (Command-T)!

Site Search removes the added step of going to a website's landing page (e.g. Amazon.com), before making your search (e.g. "socks").

Arc Site Search.gif

Open Site Search settings by:
- Hitting Command-T and typing "Site Search", or
- Heading to arc://settings/searchEngines.
Scroll to the "Site search" section and click "Add" (see image below).

Add the site's info:
- Search engine: this is a custom name for you to choose to easily identify the site. Choose the site's name, like "Twitter", "Youtube", "Amazon", etc
- Shortcut: this is a custom shortcut of your choosing. This is the letter or symbol that you'll choose to summon Site Search. One or two letters works best so it's quick. For Youtube, a good one is "yt". For Twitter, try "tw". For Amazon, try "a".
- URL with %s in place of query: this one requires precision! Go to the website of your choice and notice the query pattern on the URL.
  - Example:
    - If you go to Amazon and search for "socks", the URL will look something like this: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=socks&abc=xyz&ref=123
    - You'll notice that the URL before your search term (also called a query) is https://www.amazon.com/s?k=
    - Now, simply take that query and add %s as a placeholder!
    - The result is https://www.amazon.com/s?k=%s. This is what you'd put in the final field.
- Hit Save and you're set!

Once your Site Search has been added, you can start using it in Arc's Command bar (Command-T).

How to use Site Search in Arc.gif

Any site you search frequently is perfect! But, some of our team's favorites include:

Related to