# Search box widget

You use the *Search box* widget to enable users to search for content on your website. Once you drop the widget on a page, a text box for entering search keywords is displayed.

> info **PREREQUISITES**: You must have created at least one search index. For more information, see [Create search indexes](https://www.progress.com/documentation/sitefinity-cms/administration-create-search-indexes).

You can use the predefined widget templates, or, optionally, customize the default widget template or create a new template for the *Search box* widget. For more information, see [Widget templates](https://www.progress.com/documentation/sitefinity-cms/overview-widget-templates-mvc).

## Configure the Search box widget

1. Drag and drop the *Search box* widget on a page.
2. In the upper-right corner of the widget, click the *Edit* button to open the designer of the *Search box* widget.
3. Expand the *Where to search?* dropdown menu and select the search index you want to use for this search box.\
   The search index is a predefined set of search content. For example, you can create a search index that contains all news. When a user enters a search word, it is applied to all news items on your website.

   > info  **NOTE**: You can manage search indexes in *Administration » Search indexes*.
4. Under *Where to display search results?*, click *Select a page*.
5. From the list of pages, select a page and click *Done selecting*.

   > info  **NOTE**: You can select the page on which the search box is located, as well as any other page. You can also change the selected page later on.

   > **IMPORTANT**: You must add the *Search results* widget to the page that will display the search results.
6. Click *Save*.
7. To apply styling to the *Search box* widget, expand *More options* and set *Style* and *CSS classes*.\
   CSS classes are applied to the `<div>` element that contains the *Search box* widget.\
   In case you created predefined styles, you can use the *Style* dropdown menu, which lists your predefined styles. For more information about predefined styles, see [Add predefined styles](https://www.progress.com/documentation/sitefinity-cms/add-predefined-styles-mvc).

## Advanced options

You can specify additional properties of the *Search box* widget by clicking the *Advanced* button in the designer. You can configure the following:

* *DisableSuggestions*\
  Enter `true`, so that Sitefinity CMS disables listed suggestions while typing in the search box.
* *SuggestionFields*\
  Lists the fields to be used in the search suggestions. You must include these fields in the search index.

## Boost search results

> info **PREREQUISITES**: You see the *Boost search results* section in Advanced settings of the widget only when you are using Azure AI Search.

You use the *Boost search results* section to configure additional parameters for Azure AI Search:

* *Scoring profile*\
  Scoring profiles are part of the search index and consist of weighted fields, functions, and parameters. \
  Use scoring profiles to boost search results by customizing the way different fields are ranked.
* *Scoring parameters*\
  Scoring parameters are part of the scoring functions within a scoring profile that are boosted by tags. You don't have to configure them for other functions. \
  Add scoring parameters to boost content to appear higher in the search results by specifying the parameter's name and value. Use the following syntax: `<Tags parameter name>:<value1>,<value2>; <Tags parameter name 2>:<value1>,<value2>`

You manage the scoring profiles and parameters On the Azure Portal.\
For more information, see [Add scoring profiles to a search index](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/search/index-add-scoring-profiles).