Alternatives
Search API alternatives for AI agents
Exa, Tavily, Perplexity, Tako — and the Bing News Search API, retired in 2025. What each one costs, what it’s best at, and what it takes to switch to typesearch.
Side by side
| Provider | Their search · per 1,000 | typesearch · per 1,000 | Switching | Best at |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Exa | $7 | $1.405× cheaper | Same SDK: two lines change | Full page text; people, company and paper search |
| Tako | $7 | $1.405× cheaper | Same SDK: two lines change | Licensed data cards and charts |
| Perplexity | $5 | $1.403.5× cheaper | Same SDK: two lines change | Answers written with citations (Sonar) |
| Tavily | $8 | $1.405.7× cheaper | Rewrite one request | General web search, crawl and extract |
| Bing News Search API | Retired | $1.40 | Retired: replace it | Retired on August 11, 2025 |
List prices as each provider publishes them, checked in September 2026. typesearch charges per request, with no seats or minimums, and results served from the cache are free.
One page per provider
Exa (exa.ai, formerly Metaphor)
The Exa alternative, 5× cheaper
Everything you use Exa for in news and web search — at a fifth of the price, with the exa-py and exa-js SDKs you already have.
typesearch vs ExaTako (tako.com)
The Tako alternative, 5× cheaper
Tako’s web results, at a fifth of the price, through the Tako SDK you already use — plus verification and structure on every result.
typesearch vs Takothe Perplexity Search API and Sonar
The Perplexity alternative, 3.5× cheaper
Perplexity’s Search API, 3.5× cheaper, through the Perplexity SDK you already use — plus a calibrated score, verification and structure on every result.
typesearch vs PerplexityTavily (tavily.com)
The Tavily alternative, 5.7× cheaper
Search built for agents, like Tavily — 5.7× cheaper per search, with a calibrated relevance probability on every result and the top ones read and verified before they’re ranked. One request to rewrite; your agent stays the same.
typesearch vs Tavilythe Bing News Search API v7
A replacement for the Bing News Search API
The Bing News Search API is gone. typesearch does the same job — a query, a time window, a list of articles with title, description, date and outlet — plus a calibrated relevance probability on every result, at $1.40 per 1,000 searches.
typesearch vs Bing News Search API
Questions
What is the cheapest alternative to Exa?
For news and open-web search, typesearch: $1.40 per 1,000 searches, against $7 at Exa. It also works with the Exa SDK: change the base URL and the key.
Which search APIs work with the Exa SDK?
typesearch exposes Exa-compatible endpoints at /compat/exa — search, findSimilar and getContents — with the same parameters and response shapes. It does the same for the Tako and Perplexity SDKs.
What replaced the Bing Search APIs?
Microsoft retired every Bing Search API on August 11, 2025, and points to Grounding with Bing Search inside Azure AI Agents. If you need a list of news articles rather than a model’s answer, a news search API such as typesearch replaces it in one request.
Is typesearch a general web search API?
It’s built for news and editorial content, crawled every few minutes, with deep coverage of Latin American and European press. For product pages, docs or forums, a general web search API is a better fit.
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