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---
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stage: Data Stores
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group: Global Search
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info: "To determine the technical writer assigned to the Stage/Group associated with this page, see https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/engineering/ux/technical-writing/#assignments"
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type: reference
---
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# Advanced Search **(PREMIUM)**
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> Moved to GitLab Premium in 13.9.
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You can use Advanced Search for faster, more efficient search across the entire GitLab
instance. Advanced Search is based on Elasticsearch, a purpose-built full-text search
engine you can horizontally scale to get results in up to a second in most cases.
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You can find code you want to update in all projects at once to save
maintenance time and promote innersourcing.
You can use Advanced Search in:
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- Projects
- Issues
- Merge requests
- Milestones
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- Users
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- Epics (in groups only)
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- Code
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- Comments
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- Commits
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- Project wikis (not [group wikis ](../project/wiki/group.md ))
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## Configure Advanced Search
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- On GitLab.com, Advanced Search is enabled for groups with paid subscriptions.
- For self-managed GitLab instances, an administrator must
[configure Advanced Search ](../../integration/advanced_search/elasticsearch.md ).
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## Syntax
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See [Advanced Search syntax ](global_search/advanced_search_syntax.md ) for more information.
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## Search by ID
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- To search by issue ID, use the `#` prefix followed by the issue ID (for example, [`#23456` ](https://gitlab.com/search?snippets=&scope=issues&repository_ref=&search=%2323456&group_id=9970&project_id=278964 )).
- To search by merge request ID, use the `!` prefix followed by the merge request ID (for example, [`!23456` ](https://gitlab.com/search?snippets=&scope=merge_requests&repository_ref=&search=%2123456&group_id=9970&project_id=278964 )).
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## Global search scopes **(FREE SELF)**
> [Introduced](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/-/merge_requests/68640) in GitLab 14.3.
To improve the performance of your instance's global search, you can limit
the scope of the search. To do so, you can exclude global search scopes by disabling
[`ops` feature flags ](../../development/feature_flags/index.md#ops-type ).
Global search has all its scopes **enabled** by default in GitLab SaaS and
self-managed instances. A GitLab administrator can disable the following `ops`
feature flags to limit the scope of your instance's global search and optimize
its performance:
| Scope | Feature flag | Description |
|--|--|--|
| Code | `global_search_code_tab` | When enabled, the global search includes code as part of the search. |
| Commits | `global_search_commits_tab` | When enabled, the global search includes commits as part of the search. |
| Issues | `global_search_issues_tab` | When enabled, the global search includes issues as part of the search. |
| Merge Requests | `global_search_merge_requests_tab` | When enabled, the global search includes merge requests as part of the search. |
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| Users | `global_search_users_tab` | When enabled, the global search includes users as part of the search. |
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| Wiki | `global_search_wiki_tab` | When enabled, the global search includes wiki as part of the search. [Group wikis ](../project/wiki/group.md ) are not included. |
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## Global Search validation
To prevent abusive searches, such as searches that may result in a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS), Global Search ignores, logs, and
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doesn't return any results for searches considered abusive according to the following criteria:
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- Searches with less than 2 characters.
- Searches with any term greater than 100 characters. URL search terms have a maximum of 200 characters.
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- Searches with a stop word as the only term (for example, "the", "and", "if", etc.).
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- Searches with a `group_id` or `project_id` parameter that is not completely numeric.
- Searches with a `repository_ref` or `project_ref` parameter that has special characters not allowed by [Git refname ](https://git-scm.com/docs/git-check-ref-format ).
- Searches with a `scope` that is unknown.
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Searches that don't comply with the criteria described below aren't logged as abusive but are flagged with an error:
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- Searches with more than 4096 characters.
- Searches with more than 64 terms.
