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The Ultimate Next.js 15 Course
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Okay, I understand that when you see "Global Search" in the lesson title, you're probably thinking, "I haven’t learned this yet, or I still don’t fully understand how to implement this."
And that’s exactly why I’m here to help you test and solidify your knowledge, but not in the way you might expect.
The reason I'm not diving into a step-by-step tutorial on this is because you’ve already learned all the concepts that make up the core of a global search.
The logic itself isn’t new—it’s just a new context. If I walk you through each step again, we’d be going over the same things we've already covered in previous lessons, like:
I guess you agree on this, too: you don’t need to be taught this again. What you really need now is an opportunity to apply what you already know, to test your understanding in the context of a real-world project.
So go give it your best and test your knowledge
And in case you’re still here wondering if you could borrow some help, then this is for you, my friend—A step-by-step algorithm on how to implement global search functionality:
Create a function skeleton
Define Params
Can you think of what it could be? Yes, it is a query that the user is searching and type if a user selects only “user” or “question” specific
Perform Validations
As usual, by wrapping it with action handler middleware, you’ve learned to create
Define Search Targets
Here, you’re supposed to list what models to search in and what fields to look at as you’re showing results across different collections.
Think of it like creating a roadmap of where to search and what to match
const modelsAndTypes = [
{ model: Question, searchField: "title", type: "question" },
{ model: User, searchField: "name", type: "user" },
{ model: Answer, searchField: "content", type: "answer" },
{ model: Tag, searchField: "name", type: "tag" },
];Apply Search Logic
You now have two scenarios,
In words:
For example, searching across all models might look like,
for (const { model, searchField, type } of modelsAndTypes) {
const queryResults = await model.find({ [searchField]: regexQuery }).limit(2);
results.push(
...queryResults.map((item) => ({
title:
type === "answer" ? `Answers containing ${query}` : item[searchField],
type,
id: type === "answer" ? item.question : item._id,
}))
);
}But again — you don’t need to copy this. Think about why this works, and you can write it yourself.
Format and Return the Results
Once the searching is done, you’ll format everything and return it in a clean structure:
That’s it. Those are your steps.
You’ve seen each of these before. The challenge now is connecting the dots and believing that you can do this on your own. And trust me — you can.
Complete source code for this lesson is available at
