ScrapeMeter

Tavily alternatives

For 10,000 searches a month in each API's default search type, Tavily costs $78 (Project). 7 of the 9 other APIs we price cost less, from $10 on Serper (Google results only), $816 a year less. Of the APIs built for AI, Brave Search API, Jina Reader search, Linkup, Perplexity Search API and You.com cost $50. At 100,000 a month, Tavily costs $500.

API10,000 a monthAgainst Tavily, a year100,000 a monthCheaper in
Tavily$78–$500–
Serper
Google results		$10−$816$753 of 4
Brave Search API$50−$336$5003 of 4
Jina Reader search$50−$336$503 of 4
Linkup$50−$336$5003 of 4
Perplexity Search API$50−$336$5003 of 4
You.com$50−$336$5003 of 4
Exa$70−$96$7003 of 4
Firecrawl search$94+$192$3492 of 4
SerpApi
Google results		$150+$864$7251 of 4

Cheapest published option a month in each API's default search type, before VAT and free credits; a minus sign means cheaper than Tavily. "Cheaper in" counts the volumes (1,000, 10,000, 100,000 and 1,000,000 searches a month) where it costs less than Tavily.

Free alternatives to Tavily

APIFree allowanceSearchesRenews
Linkup$20 of credit a month for accounts signed up with a professional email4,000Monthly
Exa$10 of credit a month, no card needed, plus a one-time $10 onboarding bonus1,428Monthly
Tavily1,000 credits a month, no card needed1,000Monthly
Brave Search API$5 of credit a month; a card confirms identity but isn't charged1,000Monthly
Firecrawl search1,000 credits a month, no card needed500Monthly
SerpApi250 searches a month250Monthly
You.com$100 of free credit, and 100 searches a day through its MCP server with no key20,000Once
Serper2,500 searches to try, no card needed2,500Once
Jina Reader search10 million tokens with a new API key, for non-commercial use only1,000Once

Searches the allowance covers in the default search type. Perplexity Search API: no free allowance in the pricing we read.

What the alternatives return

Tavily alternatives: quick answers

What is a cheaper alternative to Tavily?

For 10,000 searches a month: Serper (Google results only) $10, Brave Search API $50, Jina Reader search $50, Linkup $50, Perplexity Search API $50, You.com $50, against $78 on Tavily. All 9 are cheaper at one or more of the volumes we price (1,000 to 1,000,000 a month).

Is there a free alternative to Tavily?

Free every month: Linkup, $20 of credit a month for accounts signed up with a professional email (4,000 searches); Exa, $10 of credit a month, no card needed, plus a one-time $10 onboarding bonus (1,428 searches); Brave Search API, $5 of credit a month; a card confirms identity but isn't charged (1,000 searches); Firecrawl search, 1,000 credits a month, no card needed (500 searches); SerpApi, 250 searches a month. Once, to try: You.com, $100 of free credit, and 100 searches a day through its MCP server with no key; Serper, 2,500 searches to try, no card needed; Jina Reader search, 10 million tokens with a new API key, for non-commercial use only. Tavily itself gives 1,000 credits a month, no card needed.

Is there an open-source alternative to Tavily?

Firecrawl's comparison of its open-source and cloud versions lists "Core scrape, crawl, map, and search APIs" as "Included" in the open-source version, which you run on your own servers. Jina's Reader: "The Reader service code is available on the Jina AI GitHub organization. The models used by Reader, including ReaderLM-v2 and jina-vlm, are licensed CC-BY-NC 4.0, which is not an open-source license."

What is the cheapest Tavily alternative at 100,000 searches a month?

Jina Reader search at $50 ($0.50 per 1,000), against $500 on Tavily.

Which Tavily alternatives sell a cheaper search type?

Exa's instant, $4.00 per 1,000 against $7.00 for its auto; Perplexity Search API's Fast Search, $1.00 per 1,000 against $5.00 for its standard.

Every search API at 10,000 searches a month

  1. Serper$10/mo$1.00 per 1,000 searches. Starter pack: 50,000 searches for $50, valid 6 months.
  2. Brave Search API$50/mo$5.00 per 1,000 searches. Search: $5.00 per 1,000, no monthly fee.
  3. Jina Reader search$50/mo$5.00 per 1,000 searches. $50 package: 100,000 searches for $50. Priced at the minimum 10,000 tokens a search; packages count in the month they're bought.
  4. Linkup$50/mo$5.00 per 1,000 searches. Standard search: $5.00 per 1,000, no monthly fee.
  5. Perplexity Search API$50/mo$5.00 per 1,000 searches. Standard search: $5.00 per 1,000, no monthly fee. Up to five queries in one request count once.
  6. You.com$50/mo$5.00 per 1,000 searches. Web Search: $5.00 per 1,000, no monthly fee. Up to 100 results a call at the same price.
  7. Exa$70/mo$7.00 per 1,000 searches. Pay as you go (auto): $7.00 per 1,000, no monthly fee. Up to 10 results; each result above 10 adds $1 per 1,000 searches.
  8. Tavily$78/mo$7.80 per 1,000 searches. Project: $30 a month with 4,000 searches, then $8.00 per 1,000. Credits past a plan's limit at the pay-as-you-go $0.008 a credit.
  9. Firecrawl search$94/mo$9.40 per 1,000 searches. Hobby: $19 a month with 2,500 searches, then $10.00 per 1,000. 2 credits per 10 results, from plans shared with scraping; extra credits in $5 increments.
  10. SerpApi$150/mo$15.00 per 1,000 searches. Production: 15,000 searches a month for $150.

Staying? See Tavily pricing. Head to head: Tavily vs Exa, Tavily vs Firecrawl, Tavily vs Brave Search API, Tavily vs Serper. Every search API at your volume: web search APIs for LLMs.

Prices checked against each platform's own pricing page on .