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Cloudflare pricing and alternatives: web search API, Web search, exa

Cloudflare's sitellms.txtBest web search API in 2026
17% complete: 1 of the 6 key fields we checkSee the 6 fields
$7.35per 1,000 searchesHalf of the 260 plans we rank by price cost $3.212 per 1,000 searches or less. This plan is cheaper than 26% of the 260 plans.The cheapest plan we rank by price is Keenable, free, Keyless, at $0.00 per 1,000 searches.Context.dev, Serpex and Search1API are the best web search API providers in our benchmark.
Plan: AI Gateway credits Cloudflare's only plan
Call: POST /accounts/{account_id}/ai/websearch/, Web search, exa one of Cloudflare's 3 calls
API: Web search API Cloudflare's only API

About this item

  • Freshness. We don't know how fresh this plan's data is.
  • 1 of the 6 key fields we check. Text.
  • A balance you top up. You pay any amount. You spend all of it on calls.
  • One call. You call POST /accounts/{account_id}/ai/websearch/. You send account_id, query and options.gateway.id. You set provider to "exa" and the Content-Type header to "application/json". You can also send limit and byokAlias. The call returns the matching web pages.
  • Who can get it: with conditions. Keep data: with conditions. Use data: with conditions.

Cloudflare: web search API alternatives

We list other providers' plans closest to this plan in price per 1,000 searches.

This planCloudflare, top-up, AI Gateway credits, POST /accounts/{account_id}/ai/websearch/, Web search, exaSofya, top-up from $10, Pay as you go, POST /v1/search, Search, snippets, fullTavily, $30 monthly, Project, POST /search, Search, basicWebSearchAPI.ai, $1,250 monthly, Expert, POST /ai-search, Search API, fullbrowserfoundry, $100 pack, Scale Pack, POST /api/v2/search/content
$ per 1,000 searches$7.35$7.50$7.50$7.50$7.50
Completeness17%50%50%33%17%
Billingpay firstpay firstmonthlymonthlypay first
Payany amount$10$30$1,250$100
Enough foras many as you pay forabout 1,333 calls4,000 calls a monthabout 166,666 calls a monthabout 13,333 calls
Freshnessunknownunknownliveliveunknown
Who can get itanyone with a Cloudflare account, an AI Gateway and AI Gateway credits loaded, not anyone subject to sanctions or on a list of prohibited or restricted partiesanyone: email sign-ups start at 0 credits on pay-as-you-goanyone at least 18 years old or of the age of majority, with the legal capacity to enter the Terms, or authorized to bind the companyanyone who contacts salesanyone who creates an account with an email address

Every web search API provider we score, ranked

Sources

From each provider's own pricing page and docs, and from what providers tell us. We read this row from these pages on 2026-10-27.

  1. developers.cloudflare.com/ai-gateway/features/unified-billing/index.md
  2. developers.cloudflare.com/ai-gateway/reference/limits/index.md
  3. developers.cloudflare.com/ai-gateway/reference/pricing/
  4. developers.cloudflare.com/web-search/about/index.md
  5. developers.cloudflare.com/web-search/how-to-use/index.md
  6. developers.cloudflare.com/web-search/index.md
  7. developers.cloudflare.com/web-search/providers/index.md
  8. cloudflare.com/service-specific-terms-developer-platform/
  9. cloudflare.com/terms/

Product details

The key fields this plan's answer can hold, then each filled column in its row on the sheet.

  • Date, not in the answer
  • Author, not in the answer
  • Text
  • Summary, not in the answer
  • Links, not in the answer
  • Answer, not in the answer
Price
$ per 1,000 searches$7.35
Percall
Billingpay first
Aggregators
Aggregatorsnone
Charges
Most per search10
Also pays forfrom the same budget: Web search, ceramic · Web search, linkup
In their words
Their pitchExa is a good fit when you want to pass concise, query-relevant excerpts straight into a model's context.
Data
Keep dataCloudflare sets no time limit: "images, text, and other types of data that you provide as inputs to the Service (“Inputs”) and outputs received from the Services based on your Input (“Outputs”) constitute Customer Content and you retain all applicable intellectual property or other proprietary rights in Inputs and Outputs to or from the Services", the standard terms of the search service provider bind you too where you have agreed none with it
Use dataUnless otherwise expressly permitted in writing by Cloudflare, you will not and you have no right to: (a) rent, lease, loan, export, or sell access to the Services to any third party, or sign up for the Services on behalf of a third party, (b) interfere with, disrupt, alter, or modify the Services or any part thereof, or create an undue burden on the Services or the networks (including Cloudflare’s peering partners’ networks) or services connected to the Services [...], (c) access or use the Services in a manner that violates or is intended to circumvent Service-specific usage limits, quotas, or other restrictions set forth in the Agreement, [...] (e) introduce software or automated agents or scripts into the Services so as to produce multiple accounts, generate automated searches, requests or queries, or to strip or mine data from the Services, [...] (g) reverse engineer the Services, [...] You agree not to, and not to allow third parties to use the Services to: (a) falsely imply any sponsorship or association with Cloudflare, (b) post, transmit, store or link to any files, materials, data, text, audio, video, images or other content that infringe on any person’s intellectual property rights or that are otherwise unlawful, (c) distribute viruses, worms, time bombs, Trojan horses, or other malicious code, files, scripts, software agents and programs, (d) facilitate phishing, spamming, or other technical abuse, or (e) engage in any activities that are illegal [...]. Where you have not agreed other terms with the model or search service provider, by using such Third-Party Products, you agree to comply with all restrictions, including any acceptable use policies, in the standard terms of the model or search service provider.
Rate limit
Per second3.33
Batch1
Speed
Answerin the call
The call
You sendaccount_id, query, provider "exa", options.gateway.id, Content-Type header "application/json". Optional: limit, byokAlias
MethodPOST
Path/accounts/{account_id}/ai/websearch/
About the plan
PlanAI Gateway credits
Who can get itanyone with a Cloudflare account, an AI Gateway and AI Gateway credits loaded, not anyone subject to sanctions or on a list of prohibited or restricted parties
The 9 fields the plan's answer can hold

URL, page title, description, image, favicon, last modified date, query, request ID, latency

Best GTM APIs