About Embgrep
Embgrep is a local semantic search tool for codebases and documents, aimed at developers and agents that need meaning-based file search. It combines local embeddings, SQLite storage, and incremental indexing without external services.
Key features
- 01Local embedding generation
- 02Single-file SQLite index
- 03Incremental change indexing
- 04Code- and heading-aware chunking
- 05Support for 15+ file types
Use cases
- 01Finding code by intent rather than keywords
- 02Searching project documentation in natural language
- 03Updating a file index after changes
MCP support
Embgrep provides a FastMCP server with tools to index directories, search indexed files, inspect index status, and update the index.
Configuration
Local server config is the same for every client. Copy it into your client’s MCP config file.
Tools
Local servers expose tools only once running on your machine, and the maintainer has not provided a tool list.
Details
From the project READMEembgrep
Local semantic search — embedding-powered grep for files, zero external services.
Search your codebase and documentation by meaning, not just keywords. embgrep indexes files into local embeddings and lets you run semantic queries — no API keys, no cloud services, no vector database servers.
Features
- Local embeddings — Uses fastembed (ONNX Runtime), no API keys needed
- SQLite storage — Single-file index, no external vector DB
- Incremental indexing — Only re-indexes changed files (SHA-256 hash comparison)
- Smart chunking — Function-level splitting for code, heading-level for docs
- MCP native — 4-tool FastMCP server for LLM agent integration
- 15+ file types —
.py,.js,.ts,.java,.go,.rs,.md,.txt,.yaml,.json,.toml, and more
Install
pip install embgrep # core (fastembed + numpy)
pip install embgrep[cli] # + click/rich CLI
pip install embgrep[mcp] # + FastMCP server
pip install embgrep[all] # everything
Quick Start
Python API
from embgrep import EmbGrep
eg = EmbGrep()
# Index a directory
eg.index("./my-project", patterns=["*.py", "*.md"])
# Semantic search
results = eg.search("database connection pooling", top_k=5)
for r in results:
print(f"{r.file_path}:{r.line_start}-{r.line_end} (score: {r.score:.4f})")
print(f" {r.chunk_text[:80]}...")
# Incremental update (only changed files)
eg.update()
# Index statistics
status = eg.status()
print(f"{status.total_files} files, {status.total_chunks} chunks, {status.index_size_mb} MB")
eg.close()
CLI
# Index a project
embgrep index ./my-project --patterns "*.py,*.md"
# Search
embgrep search "error handling patterns"
# Filter by file type
embgrep search "async database query" --path-filter "%.py"
# Check status
embgrep status
# Update changed files
embgrep update
Convenience functions
import embgrep
embgrep.index("./src")
results = embgrep.search("authentication middleware")
status = embgrep.status()
embgrep.update()
MCP Server
Add to your Claude Desktop / MCP client configuration:
{
"mcpServers": {
"embgrep": {
"command": "embgrep-mcp"
}
}
}
Or with uvx:
{
"mcpServers": {
"embgrep": {
"command": "uvx",
"args": ["--from", "embgrep[mcp]", "embgrep-mcp"]
}
}
}
MCP Tools
| Tool | Description |
|---|---|
index_directory | Index files in a directory for semantic search |
semantic_search | Search indexed files using natural language |
index_status | Get current index statistics |
update_index | Incremental update — re-index changed files only |
How It Works
flowchart TD
A["📁 Files"] --> B["Smart Chunking\ncode: function-level\ndocs: heading-level"]
B --> C["fastembed\nlocal embeddings"]
C --> D["SQLite\nvector index"]
D --> E["🔍 Query"]
E --> F["Cosine Similarity\nranked results"]
F --> G["✅ Matches\nwith context"]
-
Chunking — Files are split into semantically meaningful chunks:
- Code files (
.py,.js,.ts, etc.): split by function/class boundaries - Documents (
.md,.txt): split by headings or paragraph breaks - Config files: fixed-size chunking
- Code files (
-
Embedding — Each chunk is converted to a 384-dimensional vector using BGE-small-en-v1.5 via ONNX Runtime (no PyTorch needed)
-
Storage — Embeddings are stored as BLOBs in a local SQLite database
-
Search — Query text is embedded and compared against all chunks using cosine similarity
Configuration
| Parameter | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
db_path | ~/.local/share/embgrep/embgrep.db | SQLite database location |
model | BAAI/bge-small-en-v1.5 | fastembed model name |
max_chunk_size | 1000 chars | Maximum chunk size for fixed-size splitting |
top_k | 5 | Number of search results |
QuartzUnit Ecosystem
| Package | Description |
|---|---|
| markgrab | HTML/YouTube/PDF/DOCX to LLM-ready markdown |
| snapgrab | URL to screenshot + metadata |
| docpick | OCR + LLM document structure extraction |
| browsegrab | Local LLM browser agent |
| feedkit | RSS feed collection + MCP |
| embgrep | Local semantic search for files |
Used in
- newswatch — RSS news monitoring pipeline (feedkit → markgrab → embgrep → diffgrab)
License
MIT
Part of the QuartzUnit ecosystem — composable Python libraries for data collection, extraction, search, and AI agent safety.
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