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WebF1 Pad

by WebF1
How To

Web search backends

Choose and set up DuckDuckGo, SearXNG, Tavily or Exa for grounded AI chat answers.

AI chat can ground its answers in fresh web results. Settings → AI Chat → Web search picks the backend that runs the search, pick one, paste the key if the backend needs one, click Save, then flip the Web toggle in the chat composer (or let a tool-capable model decide when to search).

DuckDuckGo HTML (default)

Nothing to set up. Works with no configuration and no API key, results come from DuckDuckGo only (no Google/Bing proxying).

SearXNG

A privacy-respecting metasearch: one call fans out to Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, Brave and more, and merges the results. Keyless, but you must provide an instance URL:

  1. Self-host one (the SearXNG project has install instructions), or pick a public instance from the community list.
  2. Paste the base URL (e.g. https://searx.example.com) into the SearXNG instance URL field.
  3. Optionally pin engines (google,bing), empty uses the instance’s default mix.

There is no default instance: WebF1 Pad never sends your queries anywhere until you choose one.

Tavily

A search API built for LLMs, results arrive as clean, ready-to-read text.

  1. Create a free account at tavily.com (no credit card needed).
  2. Your API key is shown in the dashboard at app.tavily.com/home, copy it.
  3. Pick Tavily as the backend and paste the key into API key.

Free tier: 1,000 API credits per month, resetting monthly. A key looks like tvly-….

Exa

The search engine OpenCode’s built-in web search uses, strong for research-style queries.

  1. Get a key from the Exa dashboard at dashboard.exa.ai/api-keys. If the dashboard walks you through an onboarding (“create your setup prompt”), let it finish, it earns an extra $10 in free credits, and you can ignore the code snippet it generates (WebF1 Pad already has the integration built in).
  2. Pick Exa as the backend and paste the key into API key.

Free tier: new accounts get $20 in free credits (roughly 2,800 searches), and the free tier adds $10 of credits every month, no subscription.

Keeping the key out of the settings file

Every API key field also accepts a file:/path/to/key reference (a leading ~/ is expanded). The settings file stores the reference only; the key is read from the file each time it is used, so rotating the key is just editing the file. On Windows use the full path, e.g. file:C:\Keys\tavily.txt.

Privacy

DuckDuckGo and SearXNG receive only the search queries the chat decides to run. Tavily and Exa receive the same queries, tied to your account. See the privacy page for the full picture, nothing else about your notes or chats is ever sent.