How to Add AI Web Search to n8n

What You'll Learn

By the end of this tutorial, you'll be able to:

• Install the You.com community node in n8n
• Set up your API credentials securely
• Build a workflow that searches the web automatically
• Customize your searches with filters and options

Time needed: About 15 minutes

Prerequisites: An n8n instance (cloud or self-hosted)—see Part 1 if you need to set this up.

What Is You.com?

You.com is an AI-powered search and intelligence platform that provides real-time web data through a developer-friendly API. You.com APIs give you clean, structured JSON responses built for automation.

The You.com n8n node (@youdotcom-oss/n8n-nodes-youdotcom) currently exposes two operations:

• Search: Web and news results with filters for freshness, country, language, and full-page content extraction (Livecrawl)
• Get Contents: Extract clean Markdown, HTML, or metadata from any URL

Get your API key at you.com/platform.

Step 1: Get Your You.com API Key

Before we start in n8n, you need an API key from You.com.

How to Get Your Key:

1. Go to you.com/platform
2. Create an account (or sign in)
3. Click "Create API Key"
4. Enter a new key name
5. Copy the key—you'll need it in the next step

Keep your API key secret. It's like a password. Don't share it publicly or commit it to code repositories.

Step 2: Install the You.com Node in n8n

1. Open your n8n dashboard
2. Click the gear icon (Settings) in the bottom left
3. Select "Community Nodes"
4. Click "Install"
5. Type: @youdotcom-oss/n8n-nodes-youdotcom
6. Check the box acknowledging the risks
7. Click "Install"
8. Wait for installation (usually 30 seconds)

If you're running n8n yourself, you can also install via command line:

Then restart your n8n instance.

Step 3: Create Your First Search Workflow

Let's build a simple workflow that searches for a topic.

Create a New Workflow:

1. In n8n, click "Workflows" → "New Workflow"
2. Give it a name like "My First Search"

Add a Manual Trigger:

1. Click the "+" button on the canvas
2. Search for "Manual Trigger"
3. Add it to the canvas

This lets you run the workflow with a button click, which is useful for testing.

Add the You.com Node:

1. Click the "+" button again
2. Search for "You.com"
3. Add the "You.com" node by clicking on the “Search the web and news” action in Node Details

Add Your API Credentials:

When you click on the You.com node, you'll see a "Credential to connect with" dropdown at the top.

1. Click the dropdown and select "Create New Credential"
2. Paste your API key into the field
3. Click "Save"

n8n will automatically test the connection. If you see a green checkmark, you're good to go.

Step 4: Configure and Test Your Search

Now let's configure the search and run it.

Configure the Search:

1. In the You.com node settings, find "Operation" — it should be "Search" (the default)
2. In the "Query" field, type something like latest artificial intelligence news

Test It:

1. Click the "Execute step" button to test the node
2. Watch as n8n executes the search and displays the results

Step 5: Understanding the Results

The You.com node returns structured JSON data with:

Web Results (results.web)

News Results (results.news)

Metadata

‍

Step 6: Customize Your Search

Click "Add Option" in the You.com node to access additional filters:

Popular Options:

Livecrawl

Livecrawl fetches the full content of each search result page. This is useful when pairing search results with AI for summarization or analysis.

1. Set Livecrawl to "All Results"
2. Set Livecrawl Format to "Markdown"
3. Each result will now include the complete page content

Example: Daily AI News Digest

Let's build something practical. Below is a workflow that runs every morning and collects fresh AI news.

The Workflow:

Configuration:

Schedule Trigger:

• Trigger at: 8:00 AM
• Days: Monday through Friday

**You.com Node:**

• Query: artificial intelligence news breakthroughs
• Count: 10
• Freshness: Past Day

Send Email Node:

• To: your email
• Subject: "Your Daily AI News Digest"
• Body: Use expressions to format the results

Troubleshooting

"Invalid API Key" Error

• Double check your API key is copied correctly
• Make sure there are no extra spaces
• Verify your You.com account is active

"Node Not Found"

• Ensure the community node is installed
• Try restarting n8n after installation
• Check Settings → Community Nodes

No Results Returned

• Try a broader search query
• Remove restrictive filters temporarily
• Check if your API quota is exhausted

What's Next?

Now that you can search the web from n8n, there's a lot you can build. In Part 3, we will explore creative use cases and show you how to combine web search with AI tools.

Ideas to try:

• Connect results to Google Sheets for archiving
• Send interesting results to Slack or Discord
• Use an AI node to summarize the search results
• Monitor specific topics for your business