Live Search Advanced Capabilities Reach General Availability

On October 9, 2025, Adobe announced that Live Search advanced capabilities reached general availability. Specifically, startsWith and contains search operators are now available to all merchants, enabling more sophisticated search experiences without requiring custom development.

What Are startsWith and contains?

Traditional search relies on exact or fuzzy matching—finding products that match search terms approximately. startsWith enables searches matching products whose names begin with search terms (useful for brand searches or category browsing), whilst contains enables substring matching (finding products whose descriptions contain specific terms). Together, these operators dramatically improve search relevance and merchant control over search behaviour.

Real-World Applications

A customer searching "Nike Air" with startsWith returns Nike shoes before general athletic wear. A customer searching "waterproof" with contains finds not just items tagged waterproof but products whose descriptions mention waterproof features. For merchants, this means customers find relevant products faster, improving conversion rates and customer satisfaction.

Search Experience Impact

Live Search uses these operators intelligently, combining them with relevance ranking to return the most useful results first. Merchants can also configure custom rules—for instance, prioritising brand products or categories. The result is search experiences rivaling dedicated search platforms, all within Adobe Commerce.

Operator Combinations

Merchants can now combine operators—searching for products starting with specific brands that also contain specific features. This enables sophisticated filtering without exposing complexity to customers. Behind the scenes, merchants create powerful search rules that customers experience as intuitive, fast discovery.

Performance Implications

Live Search processes these operators efficiently, returning results within milliseconds even for large catalogues. Merchants with thousands of products experience no performance degradation. The operators are optimised at the infrastructure level, not requiring merchant optimisation.

Adoption and Implementation

The operators are available immediately in Live Search. Merchants can begin using them by updating search configurations. Adobe provides documentation and examples. For merchants not yet using Live Search, this GA release is an excellent time to evaluate the platform—these advanced capabilities significantly improve search quality.

Strategic Value

Search is a critical revenue driver for e-commerce. Better search means higher conversion rates and improved customer satisfaction. By bringing advanced search capabilities to general availability, Adobe is enabling all merchants to compete on search quality. For Tom&Co partners, Live Search represents an opportunity to discuss search strategy and configuration as part of commerce optimisation.