Szymdows Search is an independent search engine built from scratch to make it easier to discover more of the web. I started it because I wanted to understand how search engines work by actually building one myself, rather than just reading about them.
The problem I'm trying to address is web discoverability. There are thousands of personal, independent, creative, and lesser-known websites that can be difficult to come across. At the same time, I wanted to build a search experience that puts privacy and transparency first, without personalised search or ads in the results.
Szymdows Search uses its own crawler and index. The crawler starts with websites, checks their robots.txt, follows permitted links, and continues discovering new sites. Information from websites that allow crawling is collected and added to the index, which is then used to produce search results.
The project has grown to 20,000+ indexed websites and continues to grow through crawling and community submissions. People can also submit their own websites to help expand the index.
The project is aimed at everyday internet users who want to search and discover websites, as well as people interested in the independent and creative web.
What makes Szymdows Search different is that it is a small, independently built search engine with its own index, rather than simply relying on another search provider. I'm continuing to improve the crawler, ranking algorithm, privacy, and overall search experience as the project grows.
I'm currently looking for feedback on search result quality, relevance, usability, and what would make discovering interesting websites more enjoyable. Szymdows Search is still evolving, and I'd like the community to help shape where it goes next.
I built Szymdows Search from scratch because I wanted to understand how search engines work and create my own. It now indexes 20,000+ websites and continues to grow. I'm looking for feedback on search result quality, the user experience, and features that could make discovering smaller and lesser-known websites easier. I also want to keep improving its privacy and transparency.