Free Search & Web APIs — ranked by value

Web search & scraping APIs

Scores rate free-tier value on a 1–10 scale. How scores work →

Brave Search API Search & Web API key Independent web search index from Brave with web, news, image, video, and AI-suggest endpoints. 1k req/sec
Serper Search & Web API key Fast, low-cost Google SERP API returning structured organic, news, image, and answer-box results. 2.5k req
SerpApi Search & Web API key Scrapes real-time results from Google, Bing, Baidu, YouTube, Maps and dozens of other engines via one API. 100/moSDK
Tavily Search & Web API key Search, extract, and crawl API purpose-built to ground LLMs and AI agents with clean structured results. 1k/moSDK
Exa Search & Web API key Neural/semantic web search API with content retrieval and similarity search designed for AI applications. 20k req/moSDK
You.com Search API Search & Web API key AI-native search and news API returning LLM-ready web snippets and answers for agents. Trial credit
Bing Web Search API Search & Web API key Microsoft Bing's web, news, image, and video search results delivered as JSON via Azure. 1k/moSDK
Google Custom Search JSON API Search & Web API key Programmatic Google web and image search scoped to a Programmable Search Engine, returned as JSON. 100/dayOpenAPI
ScraperAPI Search & Web API key Web scraping API handling proxies, browsers, and CAPTCHAs, with a dedicated structured SERP endpoint. 100k cr/moSDK
ScrapingBee Search & Web API key Web scraping API with headless-browser rendering, proxy rotation, and Google search scraping. 100k cr/moSDK
Jina Reader Search & Web API key Prefix any URL with r.jina.ai to convert pages into clean LLM-ready markdown, plus an s.jina.ai web search endpoint. 20 req/min
Firecrawl Search & Web API key Scrape, crawl, search, and extract any website into clean markdown or structured JSON for AI pipelines. 1k/moSDK
Linkup Search & Web API key AI web search API that returns sourced answers and structured results from premium and live web content. 5/moSDK
SearchApi.io Search & Web API key Real-time SERP API for Google, Bing, YouTube, Maps and more with geo-targeting and pay-per-success billing. 100/moSDK
DataForSEO Search & Web API key SEO-focused APIs for SERP data, keyword metrics, backlinks, and on-page analysis at scale. Paid, usage-basedSDK
Bright Data SERP API Search & Web API key Enterprise-scale SERP API with global geo-targeting and compliant proxy infrastructure for AI grounding. Trial creditSDK
Scrapingdog Search & Web API key Budget web scraping and SERP API with proxy rotation, JS rendering, and dedicated Google/LinkedIn endpoints. 200k cr/moSDK
ZenRows Search & Web API key Web scraping API with anti-bot bypass, premium proxies, JS rendering, and a SERP scraper. 250k cr/moSDK
Apify Search & Web Token Cloud platform of thousands of ready-made scrapers (Actors) for any site, callable via a unified API. Free tierSDK
Zyte API Search & Web API key Unified scraping API with automatic ban handling, browser rendering, and AI-powered structured extraction. Free $5SDK
Crawlbase Search & Web Token Crawling and scraping API with rotating proxies, JS rendering, and a structured Scraper API for popular sites. 1k reqSDK
Scrape.do Search & Web Token Simple proxy-based web scraping API with rotating residential proxies, JS rendering, and geo-targeting. 1k/moSDK
Olostep Search & Web API key Single API for web search, scraping, and crawling that returns clean structured data for AI agents. No published capSDK
Spider Cloud Search & Web API key High-speed crawling and scraping API that outputs LLM-ready markdown and supports full-site crawls. No published capSDK
Oxylabs Web Scraper API Search & Web API key Enterprise scraping and SERP API backed by a large proxy pool with structured parsing for major sites. 7-day trialSDK
Decodo (Smartproxy) Search & Web API key All-in-one web scraping and SERP API with proxies, JS rendering, and ready-made site templates. 7-day trialSDK
DuckDuckGo Instant Answer API Search & Web No auth Free no-key API returning instant answers, disambiguation, and topic summaries from DuckDuckGo. No published cap
Wikipedia / Wikimedia API Search & Web API key Open APIs to search and retrieve articles, summaries, and structured data across Wikipedia and Wikimedia projects. 5k req/hrOpenAPI
MediaWiki Action API Search & Web No auth Open API for full-text and title search plus page content across any MediaWiki-powered site. Fair useOpenAPI
Mojeek Search API Search & Web API key Independent crawler-based, no-tracking web search index offered as a freely combinable results API. Fair use
Marginalia Search API Search & Web API key Open-source independent search engine emphasizing small, text-heavy, noncom sites, with a free JSON API. Free (non-commercial)
SearXNG Search & Web No auth Self-hostable open-source metasearch engine that aggregates many engines and exposes a JSON search API. Self-hosted
Kagi Search API Search & Web Token Premium ad-free search exposed via Search, Enrichment, and FastGPT APIs for high-quality programmatic results. 1k req
Parallel Web Search API Search & Web API key Web research and search API built for AI agents, returning ranked, LLM-optimized results with citations. No published capSDK
ValueSERP Search & Web API key Real-time Google SERP API for organic, news, places, and shopping results with simple JSON output. 100 req