images-search

✓ Official★ 159

by brave · part of brave/brave-search-skills

USE FOR image search. Returns images with title, source URL, thumbnail. Supports SafeSearch filter. Up to 200 results.

🔥🔥🔥✓ VerifiedFreeQuick setup

🧩 One of 7 skills in the brave/brave-search-skills package — works on its own, and pairs well with its siblings.

This is the playbook your agent receives when the skill activates — you don't need to read it to use the skill, but it's here to audit before installing.

Images Search

Requires API Key: Get one at https://api.search.brave.com

Plan: Included in the Search plan. See https://api-dashboard.search.brave.com/app/subscriptions/subscribe

Endpoint

GET https://api.search.brave.com/res/v1/images/search

Authentication: X-Subscription-Token: <API_KEY> header

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
`q`	string	Yes	-	Search query (1-400 chars, max 50 words)
`country`	string	No	`US`	Search country (2-letter country code or `ALL`)
`search_lang`	string	No	`en`	2+ char language code
`count`	int	No	50	Results to return (1-200)
`safesearch`	string	No	`strict`	`off` or `strict` (no `moderate` for images)
`spellcheck`	bool	No	true	Auto-correct query; corrected query in `query.altered`

Response Format

{
  "type": "images",
  "query": {
    "original": "mountain landscape",
    "altered": null,
    "spellcheck_off": false,
    "show_strict_warning": false
  },
  "results": [
    {
      "type": "image_result",
      "title": "Beautiful Mountain Landscape",
      "url": "https://example.com/mountain-photo",
      "source": "example.com",
      "page_fetched": "2025-09-15T10:30:00Z",
      "thumbnail": {
        "src": "https://imgs.search.brave.com/...",
        "width": 200,
        "height": 150
      },
      "properties": {
        "url": "https://example.com/images/mountain.jpg",
        "placeholder": "https://imgs.search.brave.com/placeholder/...",
        "width": 1920,
        "height": 1080
      },
      "meta_url": {
        "scheme": "https",
        "netloc": "example.com",
        "hostname": "example.com",
        "favicon": "https://imgs.search.brave.com/favicon/...",
        "path": "/mountain-photo"
      },
      "confidence": "high"
    }
  ],
  "extra": {
    "might_be_offensive": false
  }
}

Response Fields

Field	Type	Description
`type`	string	Always `"images"`
`query.original`	string	Original query
`query.altered`	string?	Spellchecked query (null if no correction)
`query.spellcheck_off`	bool?	Whether spellcheck was disabled
`query.show_strict_warning`	bool?	True if strict safesearch hid relevant results
`results[]`	array	List of image results
`results[].type`	string	Always `"image_result"`
`results[].title`	string?	Image title
`results[].url`	string?	Page URL where image was found
`results[].source`	string?	Source domain
`results[].page_fetched`	string?	ISO datetime of last page crawl
`results[].thumbnail.src`	string?	Brave-proxied thumbnail URL (~500px width)
`results[].thumbnail.width`	int?	Thumbnail width
`results[].thumbnail.height`	int?	Thumbnail height
`results[].properties.url`	string?	Original full-size image URL
`results[].properties.placeholder`	string?	Low-res placeholder URL (Brave-proxied)
`results[].properties.width`	int?	Original image width (may be null)
`results[].properties.height`	int?	Original image height (may be null)
`results[].meta_url.scheme`	string?	URL protocol scheme
`results[].meta_url.netloc`	string?	Network location
`results[].meta_url.hostname`	string?	Lowercased domain
`results[].meta_url.favicon`	string?	Favicon URL
`results[].meta_url.path`	string?	URL path
`results[].confidence`	string?	Relevance: `low`, `medium`, or `high`
`extra.might_be_offensive`	bool	Whether results may contain offensive content

Use Cases

Visual content discovery: Build image galleries, mood boards, or visual research tools. Use count=200 for comprehensive coverage. Prefer over web-search when you need image-specific metadata (dimensions, thumbnails).
Content enrichment: Add relevant images to articles or generated content. Use country and search_lang to target your audience's locale.
Safe image retrieval: Default safesearch=strict ensures family-friendly results out of the box. Only two modes (off/strict) — no moderate option, unlike web/video/news search.
High-volume batch retrieval: Up to 200 images per request (vs 20 for web, 50 for videos/news). Ideal for bulk image sourcing or visual analysis pipelines.

Notes

SafeSearch: Defaults to strict for images (stricter than web search)
High volume: Can return up to 200 results per request
Thumbnails: Brave-proxied for user privacy (500px width). Use properties.url for original full-resolution image.
Dimensions: properties.width/height may be missing for some images
Placeholder: properties.placeholder is a low-res URL (not inline base64) useful for progressive loading UX

Copy & paste — that's it

npx skills add brave/brave-search-skills --skill "images-search" --full-depth

Run this in your project — your agent picks the skill up automatically.

Quick Start (cURL)

Basic Search

curl -s "https://api.search.brave.com/res/v1/images/search?q=mountain+landscape" \
  -H "Accept: application/json" \
  -H "X-Subscription-Token: ${BRAVE_SEARCH_API_KEY}"

With Parameters

curl -s "https://api.search.brave.com/res/v1/images/search" \
  -H "Accept: application/json" \
  -H "X-Subscription-Token: ${BRAVE_SEARCH_API_KEY}" \
  -G \
  --data-urlencode "q=northern lights photography" \
  --data-urlencode "country=US" \
  --data-urlencode "search_lang=en" \
  --data-urlencode "count=20" \
  --data-urlencode "safesearch=strict"