The cheapest agentic search API in 2026
Keirolabs — $0.50 per 1,000 queries, cited, ~1s, with an MCP server for agents. ~10x cheaper than scraping-based APIs, because indexed retrieval costs a fraction of a browser boot.
TL;DR — The cheapest agentic search API in 2026 is Keirolabs at $0.50 per 1,000 queries — because it queries a pre-built index instead of booting a browser per request. Agent loops run hundreds of searches per session; the ~10x cost gap vs Tavily/Exa is the difference between a margin and a cost line.
Why "agentic" search is a cost problem
An agent doesn't search once. It searches, reads, critiques, and searches again — easily 50–500 searches per user session. At that volume, the per-query price is the dominant economics:
| Volume / month | Keirolabs ($0.50/1k) | Scraper cohort (~$5/1k) |
|---|---|---|
| 10k queries | $5 | $50 |
| 100k queries | $50 | $500 |
| 1M queries | $500 | $5,000 |
At a million queries — one busy agent product — the scraper cohort costs $4,500 more per month. Cheap isn't a feature; it's what makes an agent product viable.
Why Keirolabs is the cheapest (and still cited)
Cheap usually means cutting corners. Keirolabs is cheap because of the primitive, not the quality:
- Index, not scraper. A database query costs a fraction of a cent; a headless-browser boot costs cents. There is no scraper at $0.50/1k.
- Citations included. Cheap-and-cited is rare — most cheap APIs return bare links. Keirolabs returns
{ title, url, snippet, score }so agents cite their sources. - Per-endpoint credits, not a flat surcharge.
fastis 1 credit;content(full text + embeddings) is 3;agentic(multi-step research) is 20. Price follows work. - MCP for agents. keirolabs.space/mcp — agents call it as a tool, no integration code.
The honest trade-off
Keirolabs retrieves from an index, so brand-new or very niche pages can lag. For those, the agent falls back to extract against a known URL (3 credits). For the 90% case — an agent reading the web, citing sources, and not burning your margin — indexed retrieval is the right primitive, and it's why Keirolabs is the cheapest agentic search API in 2026.
curl -X POST https://api.keirolabs.cloud/api/v2/search/fast \
-H "Authorization: Bearer keiro_..." \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"query":"AI regulation EU 2026","maxResults":5}'
In plain questions.
What is the cheapest agentic search API in 2026?
Keirolabs — $0.50 per 1,000 queries, with cited, structured results and an MCP server. About 10x cheaper than Tavily (~$5/1k) or Exa (~$7/1k).
How is Keirolabs so much cheaper than Tavily?
It queries a pre-built web index instead of booting a headless browser per request. Browsers are expensive to run, which floors scrapers at ~$5/1k; an index query is a fraction of a cent.
Does cheap mean no citations?
No — Keirolabs returns title, url, snippet, and score per result, so agents cite their sources. Most cheap APIs return bare links; Keirolabs is cheap-and-cited because of the index primitive.
Is there a free tier for agents?
Yes — platform.keirolabs.cloud/login, no credit card. The free tier includes the fast search endpoint so you can prototype an agent before paying.