---
title: Search approaches
description: To deliver relevant search results, you need to choose the right search approach for your data and use case. The following table provides an overview...
url: https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3470/solutions/search/search-approaches
products:
  - Elastic Cloud Enterprise
  - Elastic Cloud Hosted
  - Elastic Cloud Serverless
  - Elastic Cloud on Kubernetes
  - Elastic Stack
  - Elasticsearch
applies_to:
  - Elastic Cloud Serverless: Generally available
  - Elastic Stack: Generally available
---

# Search approaches
To deliver relevant search results, you need to choose the right search approach for your data and use case.

## Overview of search techniques

The following table provides an overview of the fundamental search techniques available in Elasticsearch:

| Name                                                                                                               | Description                                                                         | Use when                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               |
|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| [**Full-text search**](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3470/solutions/search/full-text)           | Traditional lexical search with analyzers and relevance tuning                      | Exact words and phrases in the query should match the index. You want fast keyword matching without ML setup.                                                                                                                                          |
| [**Semantic search**](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3470/solutions/search/semantic-search)      | Search based on meaning and intent, not just keywords. A use case of vector search. | Queries use everyday language or synonyms instead of exact index terms. Get started with the managed [`semantic_text`](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3470/solutions/search/semantic-search/semantic-search-semantic-text) workflow. |
| [**Vector search**](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3470/solutions/search/vector)                 | Similarity search using vector embeddings stored in vector fields                   | You bring your own embeddings or need direct control over vector fields and models.                                                                                                                                                                    |
| [**Hybrid search**](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3470/solutions/search/hybrid-search)          | Combines full-text and vector search in one request                                 | You need exact keyword matches and meaning based matches in one result set.                                                                                                                                                                            |
| [**Ranking and reranking**](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3470/solutions/search/ranking)        | Post-processing results to improve relevance                                        | First stage retrieval is good enough but top results need finer ordering.                                                                                                                                                                              |
| [**Geospatial search**](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3470/explore-analyze/geospatial-analysis) | Location-based search and spatial relationships                                     | Results depend on location, distance, or regions on a map.                                                                                                                                                                                             |

<tip>
  Full-text search is a very powerful tool in itself. One of the key strengths of Elasticsearch is its flexibility, allowing you to start with full-text search and gradually incorporate more complex or resource-intensive approaches over time.
</tip>


## Next step

Once you've chosen your search approach(es), you'll need to select a query language to implement them. Refer to [query languages for search use cases](https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3470/solutions/search/querying-for-search) to learn about the available options.