How many plugins are too many?

[jeregon1]

I wonder if having too many plugins could slow down Flow Launcher performance, like the triggering of the bar or generating the results after typing (excluding the time configured in the settings).

[jjw24]

Hi there. It's less about the number of plugins and more about the type of plugins you have and how their search is triggered.

Some plugins need a bit of extra time to retrieve the dataset, process it, and return the results. If you also enable them to be triggered by global search, they may do this for every character you type. This results in the search bar list being updated constantly, sometimes every second, which deteriorates the user experience.

For example, in the extreme scenario where you've enabled global search for 300 plugins, you are bound to experience sluggishness because some plugins will inevitably take a slightly longer time to return their results, leaving the result list to be refreshed every two, three seconds.

This is why I always advise setting an action keyword for those plugins that take slightly longer to deliver results. However, the triggering of the search bar itself should always be instant.