Kagi Search API

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Pricing and Economics

  • Many commenters see the API price ($25/1,000 queries; 2.5¢ per search plus $19/mo business fee) as “ridiculously” or “laughably” expensive, especially for automated or agent use.
  • Some argue it’s reasonable if Kagi pays ~1–2¢ per upstream query and positions itself as a boutique, high-compute service rather than a mass-market Google competitor.
  • Several note that the pricing may be intentionally high to prevent cheap white-label reselling of Kagi’s own search.
  • Existing personal Kagi users are generally happy paying $5–$10/month for human use, but many say they would not pay current API rates.

Comparisons to Other APIs and Scraping

  • Direct price comparisons:
    • Brave Search API: about 5× cheaper ($5/1,000 vs $25/1,000), but with restrictions on storing results unless on a higher tier.
    • SerpAPI, Bing, Google: reported as significantly cheaper; some say Kagi is an order of magnitude more expensive.
    • Mojeek API is much cheaper (around 0.1¢/search), raising the question of why not use it directly.
  • Some note that SerpAPI relies on scraping public Google results, which has different costs and legal risk; others suggest that large-scale scraping is effectively “free” and more viable for serious scale.

API Design and Availability

  • API is in closed, invite-only beta; Kagi’s own statement puts general launch at about “2 months,” but another comment says API is not top priority and could stay in beta up to a year, so timing is unclear.
  • Current beta is seen as very minimal: single paid-per-request model, no pagination, and limited configuration (inherits account settings).
  • Several users wish API calls could simply deduct from their existing personal search quota rather than requiring a separate, expensive business tier.

Search Quality and Use Cases

  • Multiple users praise Kagi’s search quality, often rating it above Google, DuckDuckGo, and Brave for everyday queries.
  • Others report narrower coverage, especially with advanced search operators, and note Google still returns more hits for some specialized queries.
  • Some see the API as attractive for AI assistant tools; others say the price makes it impractical for most automation.

Privacy, Accounts, and Payments

  • Strong discussion around trust, anonymity, and payment:
    • Some are uneasy tying search to an identifiable account or credit card, especially in sensitive legal climates.
    • Kagi is said not to store search history “currently,” but several stress this is ultimately a matter of trust and weakly enforceable policies.
    • Comparisons are made to Mullvad’s anonymous account model; users suggest similar token- or UUID-based logins and cash/Monero-style payments.
    • Bitcoin payments exist, but participants point out Bitcoin is only pseudonymous and often traceable via exchanges.
  • Debate over whether privacy promises are credible without strong external auditing or GDPR-like enforcement; some argue we lack real mechanisms to verify providers’ claims.