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name: ddg-search description: Web search without an API key using DuckDuckGo Lite via web_fetch. Use as a fallback when web_search fails with missing_brave_api_key error, or whenever you need to search the web and no search API is configured. Provides titles, URLs, and snippets for research queries. Zero dependencies — works with just the built-in web_fetch tool.

DuckDuckGo Search via web_fetch

Search the web using DuckDuckGo Lite's HTML interface, parsed via web_fetch. No API key or package install required.

How to Search

web_fetch(url="https://lite.duckduckgo.com/lite/?q=QUERY", extractMode="text", maxChars=8000)

• URL-encode the query — use + for spaces
• Use extractMode="text" (not markdown) for clean results
• Increase maxChars for more results

Region Filtering

Append &kl=REGION for regional results:

• au-en — Australia
• us-en — United States
• uk-en — United Kingdom
• de-de — Germany
• fr-fr — France

Full list: https://duckduckgo.com/params

Example — Australian search

web_fetch(url="https://lite.duckduckgo.com/lite/?q=best+coffee+melbourne&kl=au-en", extractMode="text", maxChars=8000)

Reading Results

Results appear as numbered items with title, snippet, and URL. Skip entries marked "Sponsored link" (ads) — organic results follow.

Search-then-Fetch Pattern

1. Search — query DDG Lite for a list of results
2. Pick — identify the most relevant URLs
3. Fetch — use web_fetch on those URLs to read full content

Tips

• First 1-2 results may be ads — skip to organic results
• For exact phrases, wrap in quotes: q=%22exact+phrase%22
• Add specific terms to narrow results (site name, year, location)

Limitations

• No time/date filtering (DDG Lite doesn't support &df= reliably via fetch)
• Text results only — no images or videos
• Results sourced from Bing (may differ from Google)
• Google search does NOT work via web_fetch (captcha blocked)