This guide walks you through installing Google AI Ecommerce Search for nopCommerce, a free NopShine plugin that sends storefront searches to Google Cloud Vertex AI Search for commerce (Retail API). Google understands intent, synonyms and typos and ranks results by relevance. If Google is unavailable or finds nothing, your store falls back to the standard nopCommerce search, so search never breaks.
Requirements
- nopCommerce 4.10, 4.20, 4.30, 4.40, 4.50, 4.60, 4.70, 4.80, 4.90 or 5.00.
- A Google Cloud project with the Retail API enabled.
- A service account in that project with the Retail Editor role and a downloaded JSON key.
- Google charges for the Retail API according to its own pricing; the plugin itself is free.
Step 1: upload the plugin
Download the ZIP from the product page. It contains NopShine Core and the search plugin, each built for every supported nopCommerce version. In your admin area go to Configuration > Local plugins, click Upload plugin or theme, choose the ZIP and upload it. nopCommerce reads the manifest in the archive and extracts only the builds for the version it is running. On nopCommerce 4.2 and later the plugins are moved into place when the application restarts; click Restart application when prompted.
Step 2: install NopShine Core, then the search plugin
In Local plugins, find NopShine Core and click Install. After the restart, find NopShine Google AI Ecommerce Search and click Install. Core must be installed first because the search plugin depends on it.
Step 3: prepare Google Cloud
- In the Google Cloud console, open your project and enable the Retail API (also called Vertex AI Search for commerce).
- Go to IAM & Admin > Service accounts, create a service account and grant it the Retail Editor role.
- Open the service account, go to Keys, add a new JSON key and download the file.
Step 4: configure the plugin
- Go to Configuration > Local plugins > NopShine Google AI Ecommerce Search > Configure.
- Enter your Google Cloud project ID.
- Paste the content of the downloaded JSON key into Service account key. The key is stored encrypted in your database. Alternatively, set the
GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALSenvironment variable on the server and leave the field empty. - Leave location, catalog, branch and serving config at their defaults unless you created custom ones in Google Cloud.
- Tick Enabled and Use for storefront search, then click Save.
Step 5: sync the catalog
Click Sync catalog now. The plugin sends every published product with its categories, brands, tags, price, stock status, URL and main image to Google. Google needs some time to index a new catalog; until it answers, the standard nopCommerce search is used. With Sync product changes enabled, new, edited, unpublished and deleted products are sent to Google automatically from then on.
How results are filtered
Google returns product IDs ranked by relevance. The plugin then applies your store's own rules to every result: published status, store mapping, customer-role (ACL) restrictions, availability dates, and the category, manufacturer, price and vendor filters. The "Position" sort order keeps Google's ranking; name, price and newest sort the AI results.
Troubleshooting
- Results look like the standard search. Check that Enabled is ticked, that the project ID matches the key, and that the catalog sync has run. Enable Log API requests and look at System > Log for errors from Google.
- Warning about another search plugin (nopCommerce 4.x). Another plugin also replaces the product search service. Only one such plugin can be active; the configuration page names the conflicting plugin.
- nopCommerce 5.0. The plugin uses the built-in AI search hook and becomes the active AI provider when installed. Switch providers under Local plugins > Edit > Is enabled.
- Filtered searches. In nopCommerce 4.x, searches with specification-attribute, warehouse or "featured only" filters always use the standard search.
Usage statistics
NopShine Core sends anonymous usage statistics (store URL, nopCommerce version, installed NopShine plugins and their versions) to NopShine. You can turn this off on the NopShine Core configuration page.