Non-English multi-word search broken

[armamini]

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A screenshot that you have tested with "Try this API".

When entering an advanced multi-word query (e.g. a Google Dork) in another language, the API does not return the exact result.
Instead, it only returns results for the last word of the query.

For example: 'site:google.com intext:"گوشی پیکسل"'
Result: It only shows the result with the last provided word پیکسل

Link to the code that reproduces this issue. A link to a public Github Repository or gist with a minimal reproduction.

https://github.com/googleapis/google-api-nodejs-client

A step-by-step description of how to reproduce the issue, based on the linked reproduction.

No response

A clear and concise description of what the bug is, and what you expected to happen.

No response

A clear and concise description WHY you expect this behavior, i.e., was it a recent change, there is documentation that points to this behavior, etc. **

No response

[miguelvelezsa]

Hi @armamini, thanks for your report, would you mind providing more details about it? Which service are you using?

[armamini]

Hi dear @miguelvelezsa !

import { google } from "googleapis";

async function googleSearch(query, numResults = 10) {
  const customsearch = google.customsearch("v1");

  const res = await customsearch.cse.list({
    cx: "YOUR_CUSTOM_SEARCH_ENGINE_ID", 
    q: query,
    auth: "API_KEY",
    num: numResults,
  });

  return res.data.items?.map((item) => item.link) || [];
}

(async () => {
  const results = await googleSearch(
    'site:example.com inurl:article intext:"خلیج فارس"', // 👈 'persian gulf' in Farsi
    5
  );
  console.log(results);
})();

---

Issue Summary

Regarding the above snippet code, googleapis Custom Search API does not correctly handle complex queries that include Persian text with operators such as inurl: and intext:. Instead of returning results that match the full phrase, it often only matches a single word ('خلیج' or 'فارس'), or sometimes nothing at all. While the results are expected to be returned from the given website that contains the full exact phrase ("خلیج فارس").

Expected Behavior

The Custom Search API should respect the operators (site:, inurl:, intext:) and the quoted Persian phrase in the same way that direct Google Search does, returning results that match the entire phrase inside the target website.

Actual Behavior

• Queries with Persian or mixed-language text lose accuracy.
• Instead of phrase matching, the API often matches just one word or ignores the non-English words.

Impact

This makes the API unreliable for multilingual search scenarios, especially for Persian and other right-to-left languages, where exact phrase matching is critical.

Thanks for reading,
Child regards!