Put search icon near textbox using bootstrap

Here are three different ways to do it:

Here’s a working Demo in Fiddle Of All Three

Validation:

You can use native bootstrap validation states (No Custom CSS!):

<div class="form-group has-feedback">
    <label class="control-label" for="inputSuccess2">Name</label>
    <input type="text" class="form-control" id="inputSuccess2"/>
    <span class="glyphicon glyphicon-search form-control-feedback"></span>
</div>

For a full discussion, see my answer to Add a Bootstrap Glyphicon to Input Box

Input Group:

You can use the .input-group class like this:

<div class="input-group">
    <input type="text" class="form-control"/>
    <span class="input-group-addon">
        <i class="fa fa-search"></i>
    </span>
</div>

For a full discussion, see my answer to adding Twitter Bootstrap icon to Input box

Unstyled Input Group:

You can still use .input-group for positioning but just override the default styling to make the two elements appear separate.

Use a normal input group but add the class input-group-unstyled:

<div class="input-group input-group-unstyled">
    <input type="text" class="form-control" />
    <span class="input-group-addon">
        <i class="fa fa-search"></i>
    </span>
</div>

Then change the styling with the following css:

.input-group.input-group-unstyled input.form-control {
    -webkit-border-radius: 4px;
       -moz-border-radius: 4px;
            border-radius: 4px;
}
.input-group-unstyled .input-group-addon {
    border-radius: 4px;
    border: 0px;
    background-color: transparent;
}

Also, these solutions work for any input size