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When using the Exa API, you can request different types of content. On /search, content options are nested under contents; on /contents, the same options are top-level fields because the endpoint already retrieves known URLs.

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Text (text=True)

Returns the full text content of the result, formatted as markdown. It extracts the main content (like article body text) while filtering out navigation elements, pop-ups, and other peripheral text. This is extractive content taken directly from the page’s source.

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Content Filtering Options

Important: Content filtering options (verbosity, includeSections, excludeSections) require live crawling to take effect. Use maxAgeHours: 0 to force a fresh crawl for these filters.
You can control the level of detail and which page sections are included using these options:
  1. Verbosity - Controls overall content detail level:
    • compact (default): Most concise output, main content only
    • standard: Balanced content with more detail
    • full: Complete content including all sections
  2. Section Filtering - Include or exclude specific semantic sections:
    • includeSections: Only include content from specified sections
    • excludeSections: Remove content from specified sections
    Available section tags:
    • header - Page header content
    • navigation - Navigation menus
    • banner - Banner/hero sections
    • body - Main body content
    • sidebar - Sidebar content
    • footer - Page footer
    • metadata - Page metadata
Example /search configuration: 
{
  "query": "latest product updates",
  "contents": {
    "text": {
      "verbosity": "standard",
      "includeSections": ["body", "header"]
    },
    "maxAgeHours": 0
  }
}
Equivalent /contents configuration: 
{
  "ids": ["https://example.com"],
  "text": {
    "excludeSections": ["navigation", "footer", "sidebar"]
  },
  "maxAgeHours": 0
}

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Summary (summary=True)

Provides a concise summary generated from the text, tailored to a specific query you provide. This is abstractive content created by processing the source text using Gemini Flash.

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Structured Summaries

You can also request structured summaries by providing a JSON schema. This is /contents top-level form: 
{
  "ids": ["https://example.com"],
  "summary": {
    "query": "Provide company information",
    "schema": {
      "$schema": "http://json-schema.org/draft-07/schema#",
      "title": "Company Information",
      "type": "object",
      "properties": {
        "name": { "type": "string", "description": "The name of the company" },
        "industry": { "type": "string", "description": "The industry the company operates in" },
        "foundedYear": { "type": "number", "description": "The year the company was founded" }
      },
      "required": ["name", "industry"]
    }
  }
}
The API will return the summary as a JSON string that matches your schema structure, which you can parse to access the structured data.

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Highlights

Delivers key excerpts from the text that are most relevant to your search query, emphasizing important information within the content. This is also extractive content from the source. You can configure highlights in two ways:
  1. Simple boolean (highlights=True in SDKs): Returns default highlights based on the search query
  2. Detailed configuration (pass as an object): include query to guide selection and maxCharacters to cap highlight length
/search nested form: 
{
  "query": "What changed in the latest earnings report?",
  "contents": {
    "highlights": {
      "query": "revenue growth and guidance",
      "maxCharacters": 1000
    }
  }
}
/contents top-level form: 
{
  "ids": ["https://example.com/report"],
  "highlights": {
    "query": "revenue growth and guidance",
    "maxCharacters": 1000
  }
}

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Context String (Deprecated)

The context parameter is deprecated and will be removed in a future version. Do not use it for new integrations. Use highlights for token-efficient excerpts or text with maxCharacters when you need fuller page content.
context joined all result contents into one text block. To migrate, request per-result content instead and combine it in your application only if needed.

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Images and favicons

You can get images from webpages by setting imageLinks (under contents.extras.imageLinks) to specify how many images you want per result. Each result also includes the website’s favicon URL and a representative image URL when available.

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Crawl Errors

The contents endpoint provides detailed status information for each URL through the statuses field in the response. The endpoint only returns an error if there’s an internal issue on Exa’s end - all other cases are reported through individual URL statuses. Each response includes a statuses array with status information for each requested URL: 
{
  "results": [...],
  "statuses": [
    {
      "id": "https://example.com",
      "status": "success" | "error",
      "error": {
        "tag": "CRAWL_NOT_FOUND" | "CRAWL_TIMEOUT" | "CRAWL_LIVECRAWL_TIMEOUT" | "SOURCE_NOT_AVAILABLE" | "CRAWL_UNKNOWN_ERROR",
        "httpStatusCode": 404 | 504 | 403 | 500
      }
    }
  ]
}
The error tags correspond to different failure scenarios:
  • CRAWL_NOT_FOUND: Content not found (HTTP 404)
  • CRAWL_TIMEOUT: The crawl timed out while fetching content (HTTP 504)
  • CRAWL_LIVECRAWL_TIMEOUT: Content could not be retrieved within your requested livecrawlTimeout (HTTP 504)
  • SOURCE_NOT_AVAILABLE: Access forbidden or source unavailable (HTTP 403)
  • CRAWL_UNKNOWN_ERROR: Other errors (HTTP 500+)
To handle errors, check the statuses field for each URL: 
result = exa.get_contents(["https://example.com"])
for status in result.statuses:
    if status.status == "error":
        print(f"Error for {status.id}: {status.error.tag} ({status.error.httpStatusCode})")
This allows you to handle different failure scenarios appropriately for each URL in your request.