In short. Kagi Assistant uses optional Kagi Search access, with lenses and personalized domain rankings shaping its available search sources.

Definition: Kagi Assistant is an AI assistant that combines a choice of language models with optional access to Kagi Search results. As of 17 October 2026, Kagi documents controls for web access and for the sources available to Assistant searches.

Key facts

Kagi's Assistant documentation describes a web-access button below the prompt field.
Kagi's product announcement states that Assistant searches respect personalized domain rankings.
Kagi's Lenses documentation describes search filters that include or exclude websites.
Kagi's research assistants announcement describes referenced answers and attribution of citation relevance for its research assistants.

How does optional search access work?

Kagi's Assistant documentation places web access under user control. The globe control enables or disables it. The documented internet URL parameter also sets access: true enables it; other values disable it and override the selected profile's internet setting. These URLs apply that documented parameter:

https://kagi.com/assistant?internet=true
https://kagi.com/assistant?internet=false

Assistant also fetches a supplied webpage or online document as conversation context, up to 50 MB. This requires pasting its URL into the conversation with the Entire Web toggle on. A supplied URL therefore provides a direct route for adding source material to a conversation.

What shapes the available sources?

A lens is a configurable search filter. Kagi's Lenses documentation allows up to 10 included websites and up to 10 excluded websites per custom lens. Filters also cover keywords, file type and dates. Its Programming lens targets official programming language websites and forums; its PDFs lens searches for PDF files.

Kagi's Assistant announcement explicitly connects these controls to Assistant: enabling web access gives it Kagi Search results, with personalized domain rankings and lenses that narrow the search scope. For a website, this means the user's search settings affect the source pool available to the assistant. A lens that restricts results to selected domains changes which sites that search can return.

How can the sources behind an answer be inspected?

Kagi's research assistants announcement describes a research process that identifies searches, runs searches simultaneously and synthesizes findings. It shows tool calls in purple dropdown boxes that open to reveal search results. It also describes sourced answers with references and attribution of citation relevance to the final answer.

These details provide an inspection path: expand the search tool calls, then examine the answer's references against the source material. Kagi presents this design as a way to encourage further research. The announcement describes its Quick and Research assistants specifically, so those source-display details apply to that documented workflow.

FAQ

Can I change web access during a conversation?

Yes. Kagi's Assistant documentation gives the example of enabling web access for an initial question and disabling it for subsequent questions in the same thread.

Can I choose which sites Assistant searches?

Yes. Kagi's Assistant announcement says it supports lenses and respects your personalized domain rankings. A lens can narrow the search scope to selected websites.

Sources

Check how a page reads to answer engines. Open the GEO score analyzer