Best Exa alternatives for news search in 2026
Exa is a strong semantic search over the whole web. If your agent mostly searches the news, these are the options worth a look — what each is best at, what it costs and what to check before you switch.
Prices and features checked Sep 25, 2026
How we picked
People look past Exa for news when they want results judged for recency and relevance rather than similarity, publication time and outlet on every result, or a lower price per search.
We make typesearch, so read this list knowing that. Every option is a real alternative for searching news from code; they are listed in alphabetical order, with what each is best at and what to check before you choose it. Prices and features come from each provider’s own pages, linked below each card.
Pick by what you need
- An independent web index with a news endpoint: Brave Search API
- Web search for AI with sourced answers: Linkup
- Objective-driven web search and monitors: Parallel
- Low-cost web search with recency, country and language filters: Perplexity Search API
- General web search for LLM apps, with extract and crawl: Tavily
- Agents that search current news and act on it: typesearch
Side by side
| Provider | Best for | Price | Free tier | For news |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brave Search API | An independent web index with a news endpoint | Prepaid: $5 per 1,000 requests on the Search plan (news included) | $5 in credits every month | Freshness filters up to a year, or a date range |
| Linkup | Web search for AI with sourced answers | Prepaid per call: $5 per 1,000 standard searches, $50 per 1,000 deep; answers cost $1–5 more | $20 with a professional email, topped back up to $20 a month for eligible accounts | The web, with fromDate and toDate filters |
| Parallel | Objective-driven web search and monitors | Per request: Search $1 (turbo, fast) or $5 (basic, advanced) per 1,000; Task, Monitor and more | Up to 5,000 requests a month free; up to $80 at signup plus $5 a month | The web, filtered with after_date |
| Perplexity Search API | Low-cost web search with recency, country and language filters | $5 per 1,000 requests; Fast Search $1 per 1,000 | No free credit documented | Recency and date filters, country and language filters |
| Tavily | General web search for LLM apps, with extract and crawl | $0.008 per credit pay as you go: $8 per 1,000 basic searches, $16 advanced; plans from $30 a month | 1,000 credits a month | topic: "news", time ranges and dates; country only for general search |
| typesearch | Agents that search current news and act on it | $1.40 per 1,000 fast searches, $2.20 normal, $5.60 deep | $5 in credit once, valid 30 days | Its own news index: publication time, outlet and a calibrated relevance probability on every result; a rolling 30-day window |
Prices and features checked Sep 25, 2026
The options
01Brave Search API
An independent web index with a news endpoint
Why it’s on the list. News search with freshness, country and language filters at $5 per 1,000 requests, and 50 requests per second.
Check before you choose. Results come in Brave’s ranking without reading the articles, and its terms limit storing results.
Prepaid: $5 per 1,000 requests on the Search plan (news included)
02Linkup
Web search for AI with sourced answers
Why it’s on the list. Standard and deep searches that return results, a sourced answer or your JSON schema, plus page fetch.
Check before you choose. Search results don’t include a publication date or outlet; deep searches cost $50 per 1,000.
Prepaid per call: $5 per 1,000 standard searches, $50 per 1,000 deep; answers cost $1–5 more
03Parallel
Objective-driven web search and monitors
Why it’s on the list. A $1 fast mode, compact excerpts for LLMs, a publish date per result and a Monitor product with webhooks.
Check before you choose. A general web index with an after-date filter only, and no language parameter.
Per request: Search $1 (turbo, fast) or $5 (basic, advanced) per 1,000; Task, Monitor and more
04Perplexity Search API
Low-cost web search with recency, country and language filters
Why it’s on the list. A ranked web search API with recency, date, country and language filters, and a Fast Search tier at $1 per 1,000.
Check before you choose. A general web index; its answer engine is a separate product, and no free credit is documented.
$5 per 1,000 requests; Fast Search $1 per 1,000
05Tavily
General web search for LLM apps, with extract and crawl
Why it’s on the list. A search API made for agents, with a news topic, time ranges and a large ecosystem of framework integrations.
Check before you choose. News is a topic of a general web search; country filters only work on general search, and credits add up with advanced depth.
$0.008 per credit pay as you go: $8 per 1,000 basic searches, $16 advanced; plans from $30 a month
06typesearchThis is us
Agents that search current news and act on it
Why it’s on the list. A news index with a calibrated relevance probability on every result, the top ones read before they’re ranked, typed answers, tone and same-story grouping in the same call. Drop-in for the Exa, Tako and Perplexity SDKs.
Check before you choose. A rolling 30-day window, short excerpts instead of full text, and coverage that is deepest in Latin America.
$1.40 per 1,000 fast searches, $2.20 normal, $5.60 deep
Questions
What is the best Exa alternative for news?
It depends on the job. For whole-web search with news as one part, Tavily, Brave, Parallel or Perplexity. For agents that search mostly news and need every result judged, with its outlet and publication time, typesearch — which also works with the Exa SDK, so you can switch by changing the base URL and the key.
Is there a cheaper alternative to Exa?
Yes, for news: typesearch lists fast searches at $1.40 per 1,000, against $7 per 1,000 searches on Exa. Perplexity’s Fast Search ($1) and Parallel’s fast mode ($1) are cheaper still for general web search. Exa’s $7 includes the text and highlights of 10 results, so compare what each returns.
Which alternatives work with the Exa SDK?
typesearch exposes Exa-compatible endpoints (search, findSimilar and contents): keep exa-py or exa-js and point them to our base URL with a typesearch key.
Keep reading
More alternatives
News APIs, compared
Try typesearch with your own queries.
A key in a minute and $5 in free credit. If another option fits better, this page says which.