Tutorial

How to Search Movies Database with Redis

February 25, 202612 minute read

TL;DR:

You can search data in Redis by creating a secondary index with FT.CREATE and querying it with FT.SEARCH. Redis Search supports full-text search, numeric range filters, TAG exact-match filters, fuzzy matching, and aggregations — all running in-memory for sub-millisecond response times.

In this tutorial, you'll learn how to use Redis Search to index and query a movies database. You'll start with basic data modeling, create search indexes, run queries, and work your way up to advanced aggregations and a sample application.

#What you'll learn

How to model data in Redis Hashes for search
How to create a search index with FT.CREATE
How to run full-text, numeric, and TAG queries with FT.SEARCH
How to use fuzzy matching and negation in queries
How to manage indexes (inspect, alter, drop)
How to aggregate data with FT.AGGREGATE (grouping, sorting, filtering)
How to create filtered indexes for specialized queries

#Prerequisites

Before starting, make sure you have Redis running. You can follow the Redis quick start guide to set up Redis using Docker, Redis Cloud, or other methods.

For this tutorial, the quickest way is to use Docker:

Note: The container will automatically be removed when it exits (--rm parameter).

#How should I model movie data in Redis?

#Sample Dataset

In this tutorial, you'll work with a simple dataset describing movies. A movie is represented by the following attributes:

movie_id: The unique ID of the movie, internal to this database
title: The title of the movie
plot: A summary of the movie
genre: The genre of the movie (single genre per movie for simplicity)
release_year: The year the movie was released as a numerical value
rating: A numeric value representing the public's rating for this movie
votes: Number of votes
poster: Link to the movie poster
imdb_id: ID of the movie in the IMDB database

#Key Structure

A common way of defining keys in Redis is to use specific patterns. For this application, we'll use:

business_object:key

For example:

movie:001 for the movie with the id 001
user:001 for the user with the id 001

#Data Structure

For movie information, we'll use a Redis Hash. A Redis Hash allows the application to structure all the movie attributes in individual fields, and Redis Search will index these fields based on the index definition.

#How do I insert movie data into Redis?

Let's add some movies to the database using redis-cli or Redis Insight.

Connect to your Redis instance and run the following commands:

Now you can retrieve information from the hash using the movie ID:

Output:

You can also increment the rating:

Output:

But how do you find movies by year of release, rating, or title? This is where Redis Search comes in.

#How do I create a search index in Redis?

Redis Search provides a simple and automatic way to create secondary indices on Redis Hashes. For background on indexing strategies in Redis, see the Indexing and Querying guide.

Diagram showing how Redis Search indexes Hash fields into a secondary index for full-text and numeric queries

When using Redis Search, you must first index the fields you want to query. Let's index:

Title
Release Year
Rating
Genre

#Creating the index with FT.CREATE

Let's break down this command:

FT.CREATE: Creates an index with the given spec
idx:movie: The name of the index
ON hash: The type of structure to be indexed
PREFIX 1 "movie:": Index all keys starting with movie:. You can specify multiple prefixes, e.g., PREFIX 2 "movie:" "tv_show:"
SCHEMA ...: Defines the schema with field types:
- TEXT: Full-text searchable fields (tokenized and stemmed)
- NUMERIC: Numeric fields for range queries
- TAG: Exact match fields
- SORTABLE: Enables sorting on the field

Inspect the index:

Warning: Do not index all fields

Indexes take space in memory and must be updated when the primary data is updated. Create indexes carefully and only for fields you need to query.

#How do I query data with FT.SEARCH?

Now let's run some queries using FT.SEARCH.

#Text Search

Find all movies containing "war":

Output:

The movie "Star Wars" is found even though you searched for "war" because the title is indexed as TEXT, meaning it's tokenized and stemmed.

#Limiting Returned Fields

Use RETURN to specify which fields to return:

Output:

#Field-Specific Search

Use @field: syntax to search specific fields:

#Negation

Use - to exclude terms:

Output:

#Fuzzy Matching

Use % for fuzzy matching based on Levenshtein distance:

Output:

#TAG Filters

The genre field is indexed as a TAG for exact match queries:

Output:

Multiple TAG values (OR):

Learn more about Tag filters.

#Combined Conditions

Thriller or Action movies without "Jedi" in the title:

#Numeric Range Queries

Movies released between 1970 and 1980:

Using FILTER parameter:

Using query string:

Exclude a value with (:

#How do I manage Redis Search indexes?

#List All Indexes

Output:

#Inspect an Index

This returns detailed information about the index including field definitions and document count.

#Add Fields to an Index

Use FT.ALTER to add new fields:

The WEIGHT parameter declares the importance of this field when calculating result accuracy (default is 1). Here, the plot is weighted less than the title.

Now you can search the plot field:

#Drop an Index

Note: Dropping an index does not delete the underlying data. The movie hashes remain in the database.

Verify the data still exists:

Output:

Tip: Add the DD parameter to FT.DROPINDEX to also delete the indexed documents.

#How does Redis Search handle document changes?

Redis Search automatically indexes new, updated, and deleted documents.

#Insert and Auto-Index

Output: 1) (integer) 4

Output: 1) (integer) 5

The new movie is automatically indexed:

#Update Documents

Output:

#Document Expiration

When a document expires (TTL), it's automatically removed from the index:

After 20 seconds:

Output: 1) (integer) 0

Tip: This is useful for "Ephemeral Search" use cases like caching, session content, etc.

#How do I import a full movies dataset?

Now let's import a larger dataset to explore more advanced features.

#Dataset Overview

We'll import three datasets:

Dataset	Records	Description
Movies	922	Movie hashes with title, plot, genre, rating, etc.
Theaters	117	New York theater locations with geospatial data
Users	5,996	User profiles with demographics and login data

Movie fields: movie:id (key), title, plot, genre, release_year, rating, votes, poster, imdb_id
Theater fields: theater:id (key), name, address, city, zip, phone, url, location (longitude,latitude for geo queries)
User fields: user:id (key), first_name, last_name, email, gender, country, country_code, city, longitude, latitude, last_login (EPOC timestamp), ip_address

#Import the Data

First, flush the database:

Then import using redis-cli:

Verify the import:

Output:

Use DBSIZE to see the total number of keys.

#Create Production Indexes

Movies Index:

Verify with FT.INFO "idx:movie" - should show 922 documents.

Theaters Index (with Geospatial):

Verify with FT.INFO "idx:theater" - should show 117 documents.

Users Index:

#How do I write advanced search queries?

With the full dataset, let's explore more advanced query techniques.

#Conditions

Find all movies containing "heat" (in title or plot):

This returns 4 movies because:

It searches all TEXT fields (title and plot)
It finds related words like "heated" due to stemming
Results are sorted by score (title has weight 1.0, plot has 0.5)

Search only in title:

Returns only 2 movies.

Title contains "heat" but NOT "california":

Returns 1 movie ("Heat").

Note: Without parentheses, -california applies to ALL text fields:

#How do I aggregate data with FT.AGGREGATE?

Beyond retrieving documents, you often need to aggregate data. Redis provides FT.AGGREGATE for this.

#Group By & Sort By

Number of movies by year:

Number of movies by year (descending):

Movies by genre with total votes and average rating:

Count female users by country:

#Apply Functions

Number of logins per year and month:

Logins by day of week:

#Filter Expressions

Use FILTER to filter results after aggregation.

Female users by country (except China, with more than 100 users):

Logins per month for year 2020:

#How do I create filtered indexes?

You can create indexes with FILTER expressions to index only a subset of documents.

Create an index for Drama movies from the 1990s:

Run FT.INFO idx:drama to see the index definition and statistics.

Notes:

The PREFIX is required even when using FILTER

This index is useful for specialized queries but may be redundant with idx:movie

Verify both indexes return the same count:

Output: 1) (integer) 24

#How do I build an application with Redis Search?

Now let's run a complete sample application that demonstrates Redis Search in action.

#Clone the Repository

#Run with Docker Compose

This starts:

Redis on port 6380 with all data and indexes
Java REST Service on port 8085
Node REST Service on port 8086
Python REST Service on port 8087
Frontend on port 8084

#Access the Application

Frontend: http://localhost:8084
Java API: http://localhost:8085/api/1.0/movies/search?q=star&offset=0&limit=10
Node API: http://localhost:8086/api/1.0/movies/search?q=star&offset=0&limit=10
Python API: http://localhost:8087/api/1.0/movies/search?q=star&offset=0&limit=10

#Cleanup

Stop and remove all containers:

#Next steps

Now that you know how to search structured data with Redis, explore these related topics:

Indexing and Querying patterns in Redis — learn about indexing strategies using core data structures
Vector Similarity Search with Redis — go beyond full-text search with vector embeddings
Semantic Text Search with LangChain and Redis — combine LLMs and Redis for semantic search
Getting started with vector sets — learn the basics of Redis vector sets for similarity search

How to Search Movies Database with Redis

#What you'll learn

#Prerequisites

#How should I model movie data in Redis?

#Sample Dataset

#Key Structure

#Data Structure

#How do I insert movie data into Redis?

#How do I create a search index in Redis?

#Creating the index with FT.CREATE

#How do I query data with FT.SEARCH?

#Text Search

#Limiting Returned Fields

#Field-Specific Search

#Negation

#Fuzzy Matching

#TAG Filters

#Combined Conditions

#Numeric Range Queries

#How do I manage Redis Search indexes?

#List All Indexes

#Inspect an Index

#Add Fields to an Index

#Drop an Index

#How does Redis Search handle document changes?

#Insert and Auto-Index

#Update Documents

#Document Expiration

#How do I import a full movies dataset?

#Dataset Overview

#Import the Data

#Create Production Indexes

#How do I write advanced search queries?

#Conditions

#How do I aggregate data with FT.AGGREGATE?

#Group By & Sort By

#Apply Functions

#Filter Expressions

#How do I create filtered indexes?

#How do I build an application with Redis Search?

#Clone the Repository

#Run with Docker Compose

#Access the Application

#Cleanup

#Next steps

#References