Installing and running Pagefind

Pagefind is a static binary with no dynamic dependencies, so in most cases will be simple to install and run. Pagefind is currently supported on Windows, macOS, and Linux distributions.

Running via npx

For users with a NodeJS toolchain already installed, Pagefind publishes a wrapper package through npm:

npx pagefind --site "public"

This package includes the correct binary of the relevant release as a dependency for your platform.

Specific versions can be run by passing a version tag:

npx pagefind@latest --site "public"

npx pagefind@v1.1.1 --site "public"

Running Pagefind via npx will always download the pagefind_extended release, which includes specialized support for indexing Chinese and Japanese pages.

Pagefind’s npm package can also be imported and controlled from a script. See the Node API documentation for details.

Running via Python

For users with a Python toolchain already installed, Pagefind publishes a wrapper package through pypi:

python3 -m pip install 'pagefind[extended]'
python3 -m pagefind --site "public"

This package includes the correct binary of the relevant release as a dependency for your platform.

Specific versions can be installed by passing a version:

python3 -m pip install 'pagefind[extended]==1.1.1'

The above example shows installing the pagefind_extended release, which includes specialized support for indexing Chinese and Japanese pages. To install the smaller standard release, run:

python3 -m pip install 'pagefind[bin]'

Pagefind’s Python package can also be imported and controlled from a script. See the Python API documentation for details.

Downloading a precompiled binary

If you prefer to install Pagefind yourself, you can download a precompiled release from GitHub and run the binary directly:

./pagefind --site "public"
# or
./pagefind_extended --site "public"

Pagefind publishes two releases, pagefind and pagefind_extended. The extended release is a larger binary, but includes specialized support for indexing Chinese and Japanese pages.

Building from source

If you have Rust and Cargo installed, you can run cargo install pagefind to build from source.

cargo install pagefind
pagefind --site "public"

To build and install the extended version of Pagefind:

cargo install pagefind --features extended
pagefind --site "public"