In this paper we present a search algorithm that finds useful optical quantum states which can be created with current technology. We apply the algorithm to the field of quantum metrology with the goal of finding states that can measure a phase shift to a high precision. Our algorithm efficiently produces a number of novel solutions: we find experimentally ready schemes to produce states that show significant improvements over the state-of-the-art, and can measure with a precision that beats the shot noise limit by over a factor of 4. Furthermore, these states demonstrate a robustness to moderate/high photon losses, and we present a conceptually simple measurement scheme that saturates the Cramér–Rao bound.