---
title: "Understanding search sources"
slug: "understanding-search-sources"
abstract: "Conceptual overview of sources in SitecoreAI"
---
# Understanding search sources

> [!important]
> Feature availability is part of a phased rollout. Your organization may not see this functionality yet. It will become available when your environment is included in the rollout.

A search source determines what content is available in a search experience and how that content is searched.

When a visitor performs a search on your website, the results are returned from the source connected to the search component. A source contains both searchable content and the configuration that controls how that content is indexed, filtered, and ranked.

As well as defining where content is collected from, a source also contains the following configurable behavior settings:

- [Fields](https://doc.sitecore.com/sai/en/users/sitecoreai/design-components/search-experiences/understanding-search-sources/fields.html "Fields") - that determine how your data is interacted with in a search component.
- [Rules](https://doc.sitecore.com/sai/en/users/sitecoreai/design-components/search-experiences/understanding-search-sources/rules.html "Rules") - that allow you to reorder and tailor search results.
- [Advanced settings](https://doc.sitecore.com/sai/en/users/sitecoreai/design-components/search-experiences/understanding-search-sources/advanced-settings.html "Advanced settings") - that support a wider range of customer queries.

The content itself is stored in a search index. Search components query this index rather than the original content location, enabling fast and configurable search experiences.

SitecoreAI supports three types of sources:

## Content sources

A [content source](https://doc.sitecore.com/sai/en/users/sitecoreai/design-components/search-experiences/manage-content-sources.html "Manage content sources") indexes structured content from the Content editor. When creating a content source, you specify a content template and SitecoreAI ingests published items based on that template. In addition to the indexed content, a content source stores field configurations, search rules, and advanced search settings.

Use a content source when your searchable content already exists in the Content editor, such as articles, events, products, or other structured content types.

## Site sources

A [site source](https://doc.sitecore.com/sai/en/users/sitecoreai/design-components/search-experiences/manage-site-sources.html "Manage site sources") indexes content directly from a website. SitecoreAI discovers pages using sitemaps, crawls those pages, extracts content, and stores the results in a search index. Site sources also include crawl rules, URL filtering policies, extraction settings, and field mappings.

Use a site source when you want to create search experiences from website content, including websites that are not managed in the Content editor.

> [!important]
> Some websites use firewalls, bot protection, or web application firewall (WAF) services that can block crawlers. If your website restricts incoming traffic, you might need to [allowlist SitecoreAI crawler IP addresses](https://doc.sitecore.com/sai/en/users/sitecoreai/design-components/search-experiences/manage-site-sources/sitecore-ip-allowlist.html "Sitecore IP allowlist") before the site can be indexed successfully.

## Push sources

A [push source](https://doc.sitecore.com/sai/en/users/sitecoreai/design-components/search-experiences/manage-push-sources.html "Manage push sources") indexes content submitted directly to SitecoreAI using the [Ingestion Service API](https://doc.sitecore.com/sai/en/developers/sitecoreai/search-experiences/ingestion-service-api.html "Ingestion Service API"). SitecoreAI stores the submitted documents in the source's index, where connected search experiences can return them.

Use a push source when an external system is the system of record, when the content cannot be crawled, or when you need to submit content for near real-time indexing. Define the source's fields before submitting documents. Push sources do not retain a history of submitted documents, so to rebuild the index, you must submit the full set of documents again.