Solr Query Syntax

The default Solr query syntax used to search an index uses a superset of the Lucene query syntax.

Trying a basic query

The main query for a solr search is specified via the q parameter. Standard Solr query syntax is the default (registered as the “lucene” query parser).

http://localhost:8983/solr/query?q=test

If this is new to you, please check out the Solr Tutorial.

Adding debug=query to your request will allow you to see how Solr is parsing your query.

http://localhost:8983/solr/query?debug=query&q=hello

{
  "responseHeader":{
    "status":0,
    "QTime":0,
    "params":{
      "q":"hello",
      "debug":"query"}},
  "response":{"numFound":0,"start":0,"docs":[]
  },
  "debug":{
    "rawquerystring":"hello",
    "querystring":"hello",
    "parsedquery":"text:hello",
    "parsedquery_toString":"text:hello",
    "QParser":"LuceneQParser"}}

The response section will normally contain the top ranking documents for the query. In this example, no documents matched the query.
In the debug section, one can see how the query was parsed, and the fact that text was used as the default field to search.

Basic Queries

A “term” query is a single word query in a single field that must match exactly.
In this example text is the field name, and hello is the word we are going to match in that field.

text:hello

Phrase Query

A phrase query matches multiple terms (words) in sequence.

text:"yonik seeley"

This query will match text containing Yonik Seeley but will not match Yonik C Seeley or Seeley Yonik.

Internally, a phrase query is created when the fieldType produces multiple terms for the given value. For the example above, the fieldType splits on whitespace and lowercases the result, and we get two terms… [yonik, seeley]. If our fieldType had been string, a single term of yonik seeley would have been produced since string fields do not change values or do text analysis in any way.

Proximity Query (aka Sloppy Phrase Query)

A proximity query, is like a phrase query with a tilda (~) followed by a slop that specifies the number of term position moves (edits) allowed.

text:"solr analytics"~1

This query will match text containing solr analytics, solr faceted analytics (edit distance 1), and analytics solr (edit distance 1). It will not match solr super faceted analytics or analytics faceted solr since those would both require an edit distance of 2 to get the terms into the matching positions.

Boolean Query

A boolean query contains multiple clauses. A clause may be optional, mandatory, or prohibited.

solr search

The default operator is “OR”, meaning that clauses are optional. When there are no mandatory clauses, at least one of the optional clauses in a query must match for the full query to match. The example query above will thus match documents containing solr or search (or both) in the default search field.

Boolean query examples:

+solr +search facet -highlight     /* uses + for mandatory and - for prohibited */
solr AND search OR facet NOT highlight  /* this is equivalent to the first query */

Semantics: solr and search must both match, highlight must not match. facet may or may not match but will contribute to the query score if it does (i.e. the presence of the facet only affects scores of matching documents, not which documents match.)

+text:solr text:facet text:analytics
text:(+solr facet analytics)  /* This is equivalent to the first query *?

The query above just demonstrates an optional syntax for specifying multiple clauses with the same field.

(+title:solr +title:(analytics faceting)) OR (+body:solr +body:(analytics faceting)) 

The query above uses parenthesis for precedence. Both solr and either analytics or faceting must match in the title field or in the body field.

Boosted Query

Any query clause can be boosted with the ^ operator. The boost is multiplied into the normal score for the clause and will affect its importance relative to other clauses.

Boosted Query Examples:

text:solr^10 text:rocks
text:(solr^10 rocks)
(inStock:true AND text:solr)^123.45 text:hi

Range Query

A range query selects documents with values between a specified lower and upper bound. Range queries work on numeric fields, date fields, and even string and text fields.

Range Query Examples:

  age:[18 TO 30]       // matches age 18-30 inclusive (endpoints 18 and 30 are included)
  age:[18 TO 30}       // matches age>=18 and age<30
  age:[65 TO *]        // "open ended" range matches age>65
  age:[* TO *]         // matches all documents with age set

Range Query on Text Fields:

  name:[apple TO banana]  // matches *any* term/word in the name field between apple and banana   

Constant Score Query

A ConstantScoreQuery is like a boosted query, but it produces the same score for every document that matches the query. The score produced is equal to the query boost. The ^= operator is used to turn any query clause into a ConstantScoreQuery.

Constant Score Query Examples:

+color:blue^=1 text:shoes
(inStock:true text:solr)^=100 native code faceting

Filter Query

(Since Solr 5.4)
A filter query retrieves a set of documents matching a query from the filter cache. Since scores are not cached, all documents that match the filter produce the same score (0 by default). Cached filters will be extremely fast when they are used again in another query.

Filter Query Example:

description:HDTV OR filter(+promotion:tv +promotion_date:[NOW/DAY-7DAYS TO NOW/DAY+1DAY])

The power of the filter() syntax is that it may be used anywhere within a lucene/solr query syntax. Normal fq support is limited to top-level conjunctions. However when normal top-level fq filter caching can be used, that form is preferred.

Query Comments

(Since Solr 5.3)
One can embed comments in a query using C-style comments surrounded with /* */. Comments can be nested.

Query Comments Example:

description:HDTV /* TODO: +promotion:tv +promotion_date:[NOW/DAY-7DAYS TO NOW/DAY+1DAY] */