Algolia
| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Internet search engines |
| Founded | 2012 |
| Founder | Nicolas Dessaigne, Julien Lemoine |
| Headquarters | San Francisco , United States |
Area served | Worldwide |
| Products | Search-as-a-service platform, web search solutions |
Algolia is a proprietary search-as-a-service platform originating from France, with its main office located in San Francisco and additional branches in Paris and London. Its primary offering is a web search solution designed specifically for individual websites.
Company
Established in 2012 by Paris-based founders Nicolas Dessaigne and Julien Lemoine, Algolia initially concentrated on mobile phone search functionality for offline use. The company participated in Y Combinator's Winter 2014 cohort. Beginning with two data centers situated in Europe and the United States, Algolia expanded by adding a third facility in Singapore by March 2014. By 2019, the company operated more than 70 data centers distributed across 16 global regions. Algolia supports over 18,000 clients and handles upwards of 1.75 trillion search queries each year.
In May 2015, Algolia raised $18.3 million during its Series A funding round led by Accel Partners, followed by a $53 million Series B round in 2017, also spearheaded by Accel. From June 2016 through September 2019, the platform saw notable growth among smaller websites within the "top 1 million" and "top 10k" sites monitored by Built With.
To strengthen its platform with advanced machine learning features, Algolia acquired Romanian AI startup Morphl in January 2021. Later that year, in July 2021, the company secured $150 million in Series D funding, reaching unicorn status with a valuation of $2.25 billion.
Products and technology
Algolia provides search as a service, delivering customized web search solutions hosted externally and tailored to individual client websites. Unlike broad web search engines such as Google, Algolia indexes only the clients' own websites. Customers upload their site data via a RESTful JSON API, allowing for straightforward embedding of search functionality within their web pages.
API
The platform exposes its search features through multiple APIs. Its REST API facilitates essential operations including searching, analytics, and monitoring across ten different programming languages and environments, enabling extensive integration options for users.
Infrastructure
To prevent any single point of failure, Algolia designed a worldwide infrastructure named the Distributed Search Network (DSN). This system directs queries to the closest data center to minimize latency. Additionally, clients can select specific locations within Algolia’s network for data replication to boost both reliability and performance.