Ajax Search Lite vs Better Search
Compare WordPress plugins and tools side by side. Pick products with “Compare” in the software directory.
| Feature | Ajax Search Lite v4.14.7 · checked 23 Oct 2026 Free + paid · ★ 4.8/5 Visit Details | Better Search v4.5.2 · checked 23 Oct 2026 Free · ★ 4.4/5 Visit Details |
|---|---|---|
| At a glance | ||
| Active installs | 70,000+ | 5,000+ |
| Last updated | October 19, 2026 | October 16, 2026 |
| Editions | Ajax Search Lite · Ajax Search Pro ($) | Better Search · Better Search Pro ($) |
| Pros | Live results as visitors type; Custom post types, custom fields and categories searched; Free, with WooCommerce price fields in results | Relevance-ranked search with weighting for titles and content; Live search, popular-search heatmap and search widgets |
| Cons | Pro features need a paid licence; Upgrade prompts appear in the admin menu and sidebar; Google keyword suggestions call an external Google endpoint | Some options and features are reserved for the paid Pro edition; Extra settings and tables can take time to tune |
| Mentioned in our posts | 1 | 1 |
| More features | ||
| Other features | Live AJAX search results as the visitor types, Search by custom fields, Category and taxonomy search, Google keyword suggestions, Cached search results with hourly retention cron, WooCommerce price field in results, Upgrade to Pro menu item | Relevance-ranked search results, Live search as visitors type, Popular searches heatmap shortcode, Search form shortcode, Search box widget, Search heatmap widget, Language-aware search for Polylang and WPML, Freemius upgrade and account prompts |
| Integrations | ||
| Analytics | — | Freemius |
| E-commerce | WooCommerce | WooCommerce |
| Plugins | WPML, Polylang, BuddyPress, Divi | Polylang, WPML, Yoast SEO |
| Other | Google Suggest | — |
| Requires WordPress | 3.5 | 6.9 |
| Requires PHP | 7.4 | 7.4 |
| Tested up to | 7.1 | 7.1 |
| Phones home | No | Only if you agree |
| External services | suggestqueries.google.com | api.freemius.com |
| Blocks | 1 | — |
| Shortcodes | — | 2 |