In a support discussion titled ‘Use algolia plugin in hosted discourse?’, CarltonHenderson asks whether the official Algolia plugin can be used on hosted Discourse, and if not, whether open-source crawlers can sync data from hosted Discourse to Algolia. maiki clarifies that the plugin is available only on the Enterprise tier, which is not suitable for small sites, and directs users to https://www.discourse.org/plugins to check plugin availability. They note the plugin not only populates Algolia’s index but also integrates results into Discourse’s search UI, and suggest that while there may be alternative ways to populate Algolia, they’re not straightforward. In response to CarltonHenderson asking about Enterprise pricing for small sites, maiki confirms that Enterprise is not designed for small communities and advises that small sites should consider self-hosting Discourse instead, where the plugin is fully supported. Self-hosting instructions are available at https://github.com/discourse/discourse/blob/master/docs/INSTALL-cloud.md. The conversation underscores that hosted Discourse plans do not support the Algolia plugin for small forums, and self-hosting is the recommended path for those needing this functionality.
The algolia plugin is an official plugin, so is it possible to use it on the hosted discourse service? If not, are there other alternatives such as open-source crawlers that people use successfully to get data from a hosted discourse into algolia?
Thanks,
Carl
Hi Carl. 
It is, on the Enterprise tier. The easy way to determine is to visit https://www.discourse.org/plugins, and if an official plugin is not otherwise on that list, it’s Enterprise. 
Are you only interested in populating Algolia? The plugin does that and additionally incorporates the Algolia results in the Discourse search interface. There may be some clever ways to populate the index… 
Maiki, thanks for the quick reply. About how much does the Enterprise tier cost for a small site / forum?
It isn’t for small sites (you can always check pricing and features of each plan at Discourse pricing | Discourse - Civilized Discussion). If the Algolia plugin is needed for your small site, our hosted plans won’t work for your community.
However, small communities can use self-hosted Discourse, where you’d also be able to use the Algolia plugin.
The self-hosted instructions are available at discourse/docs/INSTALL-cloud.md at main · discourse/discourse · GitHub. 