> This is currently $19/mo plus search API cost (2.5c per search). Please reach out to support@kagi.com for invite.
Isn't 2.5c per search kind of expensive? serp api is 1 cent for the $150/month = 15k searches plan
Isn't 2.5c per search kind of expensive? serp api is 1 cent for the $150/month = 15k searches plan
Kind of doesn't make sense to compare to them.
There is demand for search APIs, and companies like Kagi can build a business around that, grow and then compete more generally with Google over time. Serp makes that difficult.
For competitive reasons Google might not want to sell a search API directly (they might indirectly fuel a lot of competition against their main ad supported product). So letting Serp offer this service in a bit of a gray area makes it hard for competitors to form a beach head in search, while giving Google legal flexibility to shut down any service that tries to compete with them in any way through Serp's data.
It's also strongly recommended when you're on the selling side, as you should be prepared to explain what added value justifies that your product is so much more expensive.
High end "boutique" search offering a refined search experience (at high computational cost) is a niche Google search can't compete with, since they're offering their search for free, and they'd take massive losses if they drastically increased the amount of compute per query.
And honestly, anything that gets more people into the idea of using not-Google for searching is good for Kagi - even if it is to an ostensibly competitor.