VSW – Visual Search for WooCommerce

VSW – Visual Search adds a responsive image-upload search form to WooCommerce. Customers can upload, preview, and crop a photo, optionally filter the catalogue, and open visually similar products.

Created by Awais Awan.

Features include:

• Drag-and-drop and mobile-camera image upload.
• Browser-based image cropping.
• Featured, gallery, and variation-image indexing.
• Category, price, stock, and global product-attribute filters.
• Shortcode and Gutenberg block.
• One-time setup indexing and administrator-controlled catalogue reindexing.
• Privacy-safe aggregate search and click analytics.
• Configurable colours, grid columns, image ratios, and result labels.
• Floating storefront image-search launcher.
• Full, compact, and minimal search-form presets.
• Elementor widget and privacy-safe analytics CSV exports.

Use [vswvisef_visual_search] on any page or add the VSW – Visual Search block.

External service

This plugin connects to Visual Search Cloud at https://visualsearch.predictsx.com because image feature extraction and catalogue comparison are performed by the hosted service. The store administrator explicitly approves the connection before any catalogue or search data is sent. All features shipped in the GPL plugin remain available; subscriptions pay only for hosted processing, storage, and usage.

Service terms: https://visualsearch.predictsx.com/terms

Service privacy policy: https://visualsearch.predictsx.com/privacy

The service receives:

• Product image bytes, product and variation IDs, names, URLs, prices, stock status, and category names during indexing.
• The shopper’s uploaded or cropped image, selected category, requested result limit, and search settings during a search.
• Product and variation IDs when a shopper clicks a result, for aggregate analytics.

The included Laravel service processes images in memory and stores numerical visual descriptors for indexed product images. It does not retain shopper-uploaded images, shopper filenames, or shopper IP addresses in analytics. WordPress temporarily stores a one-way hash derived from the shopper IP for five-minute abuse-rate limiting.

The service is operated by Awais Awan. Store administrators who self-host the included Laravel service are the service operator for their installation.

Source code for the plugin is included in this release package under source/assets/. The readable JavaScript and CSS files in that directory are the source for the distributed files in assets/. The distributed files are intentionally kept free of third-party dependencies; no external JavaScript or CSS library is bundled.

Development and build

The plugin has no dependency installation step. Edit the human-readable files in source/assets/, then copy the corresponding files to assets/ for a release. The distributed files are intentionally kept free of third-party dependencies.

Privacy

Store owners should disclose that product images and customer-selected search images are sent to their configured visual-search service. The plugin does not add third-party advertising or tracking scripts. Search-result click tracking is limited to product IDs and a random search identifier.

1. Install and activate WooCommerce.
2. Upload and activate VSW – Visual Search for WooCommerce.
3. Open WooCommerce > Visual Search.
4. Connect your hosted visual-search account.
5. Wait for the first catalogue index to complete.
6. Add [vswvisef_visual_search] to a page or insert the VSW – Visual Search block.

1. 

   Responsive storefront image upload, category selection, and advanced WooCommerce filters.

2. 

   Browser-based crop editor with drag positioning and zoom control.

3. 

   Ranked visual product results with similarity labels and purchase actions.

2.0.5

• Renamed plugin-owned identifiers with the distinct vswvisef prefix, added legacy option migration, and included readable asset sources for WordPress.org review.

2.0.4

• Clarified the hosted-service model and added direct service Terms and Privacy Policy links for WordPress.org review.

2.0.3

• Added complete author metadata and completed the WordPress.org release-package audit.

2.0.2

• Resolved Plugin Check security, internationalization, hook-prefix, filesystem, and metadata findings.

2.0.1

• Improved spacing, labels, and responsive layout for custom-label and floating-search settings.

2.0.0

• Consolidated every former Pro add-on feature into the main plugin; SaaS subscriptions are now the only paid layer.

1.10.0

• Removed recurring catalogue sync and product-save indexing; indexing now starts once during setup or manually.

1.9.0

• Added a clear plan comparison and usage-based subscription recommendation.

1.8.0

• Simplified onboarding with a built-in hosted service URL and a polished connection workflow.

1.7.1

• Display the correct PayPal sandbox or live-payment status in WooCommerce settings.

1.7.0

• Replaced Stripe controls with secure PayPal subscription approval and cancellation.

1.6.2

• Prepared the free plugin package and service/privacy documentation for WordPress.org review.

1.6.1

• Added unique crop-dialog identifiers for pages containing multiple search forms.