React InstantSearch FAQ

The RatingMenu doesn’t support float values. You can store an integer representation of this value in your records (for example, 0.5 * 10 = 5) and display the original value in your UI.

To search only when the query is longer than a certain length, you can implement a proxy search client. Then, you can add a condition, for example, query.length > 3.

A custom RefinementList widget will show up to showMoreLimit refinement items in items. It lets you sort the items as you want before they’re trimmed. However, it means you need to slice to the desired limit, and keep track of isShowingMore in local state:

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const CustomRefinementList = connectRefinementList(function RefinementList({
  items,
  limit,
  showMoreLimit
}) {
  const [isShowingMore, toggleShowMore] = React.useState(false)
  const itemsToDisplay = items.slice(
    0,
    isShowingMore ? showMoreLimit : limit
  )

  // render using `itemsToDisplay`
})

The uiState works only when the widgets responsible for each UI state attribute is mounted. For instance, a SearchBox widget is necessary to provide a query.

The JavaScript API client caches redundant searches in memory. This avoid sending unnecessary requests to Algolia, and reuses the data you already fetched. If you notice this behavior isn’t working, you might be recreating the search client over every render.

The cache exists at the client instance level, it isn’t shared across different instances. Make sure you create the search client just once.

A typical error is to instantiate the client inside a React component. This causes the code to run for every render. For example, instead of doing:

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function App() {
  const searchClient = algoliasearch();

  return <InstantSearch searchClient={searchClient} />
}

// or

function App() {
  return <InstantSearch searchClient={algoliasearch()} />
}

Make sure to instantiate the client outside of your component tree, and pass it down by reference.

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const searchClient = algoliasearch();

function App() {
  return <InstantSearch searchClient={searchClient} />
}

// or

function App({ appId, apiKey }) {
  // Useful when you need to update the `appId` and `apiKey` at runtime
  // for example when using Secured API keys
  const searchClient = useMemo(() =>
    algoliasearch(appId, apiKey),
    [appId, apiKey]
  );

  return <InstantSearch searchClient={searchClient} />
}

When the DynamicWidgets receives results, it mounts the chosen widgets for that result. An initial search does two network requests. This is because adding a new widget requires a new network request, to know what the refinements are for a facet.

You can avoid this by forcing all facets to be returned by Algolia, or all facets that you maximally want to display the results of. This can be done by adding facets: ['*'] and maxValuesPerFacet using a Configure widget:

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<Configure
  facets={['*']}
  // the highest value you could mount in "limit" and "showMoreLimit"
  maxValuesPerFacet={10}
/>
<ExperimentalDynamicWidgets fallbackComponent={Menu}>
  <RefinementList attribute="brand" />
  <HierarchicalMenu attributes={['hierarchical.lvl0', 'hierarchical.lvl1']} />
  <Panel>
    <Menu attribute="category" />
  </Panel>
</ExperimentalDynamicWidgets>