Discover External Research
The Discover tab lets you search across 600M+ papers from major academic databases, without leaving Virza. Find new research, import papers, and build your library from the world’s largest academic indexes.
Available databases
| Database | Coverage | Strength |
|---|---|---|
| Semantic Scholar | 600M+ papers | Strong citation data, computer science, biomedicine |
| OpenAlex | 250M+ works | Comprehensive multidisciplinary coverage |
| PubMed | 36M+ records | Biomedical and life sciences |
| ArXiv | 2.4M+ preprints | Physics, mathematics, computer science, quantitative biology |
| Crossref | 150M+ DOI records | Structured metadata, DOI registry |
| Exa | Real-time web | News, preprints, recent publications |
All databases are searched simultaneously. Results are deduplicated by DOI and URL, then merged into a single ranked list.
How Discover ranking works
External results are ranked using four signals:
- Provider relevance score (35%): how well the paper matches your query according to each database
- Citation count (25%): logarithmically normalized citation impact
- Recency (25%): exponential decay with a 5-year half-life favoring newer research
- Source diversity (15%): penalizes result clustering from a single database
Using Discover
- Open the Search page from the sidebar
- Click the Discover tab (globe icon)
- Type your research question or keywords
- Browse results. Each card shows title, authors, year, venue, and citation count
- Click Save to Library on any result to import it into your workspace
Papers already in your library are marked with a “Saved” badge so you can easily identify what’s new.
Discover searches are not counted against your plan’s usage limits. They are rate-limited to 10 requests per minute per workspace.
Smart tab blending
When you search on the All tab, Virza blends your library results with Discover results:
- Your library papers appear first, ranked by the full 7-signal scoring system
- Up to 5 unique external papers are interleaved: papers that match your query but aren’t in your library yet
- External papers already in your library are automatically deduplicated
This gives you a unified view: your existing research alongside what else is out there.
Tips
- Use Discover for literature reviews: search a broad topic, then save relevant papers to a dedicated collection
- Check citation counts: highly-cited papers in Discover are often seminal works worth adding to your library
- Try the All tab first: it shows both your library and external results, helping you spot gaps in your collection
- Refine with specific queries: author names, DOIs, and exact paper titles work well for finding specific papers