To set WooCommerce to search product title only, navigate to Elevated › Product Search › Settings › Advanced Options. In the Search Scope panel, toggle Description, Short Description, SKUs, Attributes, Categories, and Tags to OFF. Remove any custom fields. Click Save Settings. The indexer updates automatically. Product titles are always searchable and cannot be disabled.
Navigate to Elevated › Product Search › Settings.
Look for the Advanced Options section on the left side of the page. Click Advanced Options to expand it.
The Search Scope panel appears at the top of the expanded section.
Product titles are always included in the search index and cannot be disabled. To restrict the search to titles only, disable every other field.
In the Search Scope panel, toggle the following fields to OFF:
Only the title data remains active in the search scope.
If you previously added custom fields to the search index, remove them to prevent non-title data from appearing in results.
Look for the Search in Custom Fields section below the toggles.
Click the X next to each custom field to remove it. Ensure the section is empty before saving.
Click Save Settings at the top of the page.
The indexer automatically rebuilds to include only product titles. A success message appears indicating the number of products indexed.
Visit a page on your frontend where the search form is placed.
Search for a word that appears in product descriptions or SKUs but does not appear in any product title. Confirm that no results appear.
Then search for a word that appears in a product title. Confirm that matching products appear in the dropdown.
Restricting WooCommerce search to product title only creates a focused search experience where customers only find products when their query matches the product name. This prevents broad matches from long descriptions, short descriptions, or category names that might return irrelevant results.
For example, if you sell a shirt with a description that mentions “perfect for summer weddings,” a customer searching for “wedding” would see that shirt in results if descriptions are enabled. With title-only search, the shirt appears only if the word “wedding” is in the product title. This reduces noise and keeps results tightly relevant.
Title-only search also produces the smallest possible search index. Because the indexer only extracts title text, the index file is smaller, and queries execute with minimal overhead. For stores with tens of thousands of products, this can marginally improve response time.
If you later decide to expand the search to include SKUs, attributes, or other fields, toggle those fields back to ON in the Search Scope panel and save. The indexer will rebuild automatically to include the newly enabled data.
Search still returns results from descriptions
Verify that Description and Short Description are toggled to OFF in the Search Scope panel. Confirm no custom fields remain in the Search in Custom Fields section. If changes were made recently, click Force Index Rebuild in the Indexer section and test again.
No search results appear at all
Confirm the search term exists in at least one product title. Check that the search form is functional on the frontend by typing a known product name exactly as it appears in the catalog.
Custom field data still appears in results
Remove the custom field from the Search in Custom Fields section. If the field was removed but results persist, click Force Index Rebuild to clear stale index data.
