You.com
Web search and research APIs for AI agents
Profile researched and drafted with AI assistance from published sources; edited and published by NorwegianSpark SA (editorial policy).
Official website: you.com
About You.com
You.com has changed what it sells. The homepage that used to offer a consumer AI search engine with research, coding and creative modes now leads with web search APIs for agents and LLMs: a Web Search API, a Contents API that returns page text, an Answer API, a Research API in several depths and a Finance Research API, with an MCP server for agent frameworks. If you arrived here looking for a ChatGPT alternative, that product is not what the company is presenting in October 2026, and Perplexity on this site is the closer match. If you are building a research agent of your own, the plans page (read 16 October 2026) is unusually simple: a Free tier with 100 Web Search API queries a day through MCP and no card, then pay as you go at $5 per 1,000 Web Search calls, $1 per 1,000 pages on the Contents API, $5 per 1,000 Answer calls and Research calls from $12 to $1,200 per 1,000 depending on depth, with no seats or platform fee; the page also mentions $100 of free credit, which it equates to 20,000 searches. The limits are the usual ones for an API: you get data, not a finished answer, and quality depends on how you prompt and rank what comes back. Verdict: a good, transparently priced search layer for developers; not a tool for someone who wants to type a question and read an answer.
Best For
Developers and teams building agents or RAG pipelines that need a live web-search step with predictable per-call pricing. Not for readers who want a consumer AI search engine — use Perplexity for that — or for anyone who needs finished answers rather than retrieved data.
Key Features
- Web Search, Contents, Answer and Research APIs
- MCP server for agent frameworks
- Free: 100 Web Search queries a day, no card
- $5 per 1,000 Web Search calls; $1 per 1,000 pages
- Research API from $12 to $1,200 per 1,000 calls by depth
- No seats, minimums or platform fee
Category
Research →How You.com compares in Research
The 6 research agents we track, listed alphabetically. All of them publish a free tier. Prices are the vendor’s own published starting figure and change without notice — check the vendor’s pricing page before committing.
The bar under a price compares that plan with the dearest monthly plan in this table (4 of the 6 rows are flat monthly prices). Custom, per-seat, per-usage and annual prices are not on the same scale, so they carry no bar — a missing bar does not mean cheaper.
| Tool | Starting price | Pricing model | Free tier |
|---|---|---|---|
 Consensus | $9/mo | Freemium | Yes |
 Elicit | $49/mo | Freemium | Yes |
 Gemini Deep Research | Free (usage limits apply) | Included in Gemini plans | Yes |
 Humata | $9.99/mo | Freemium, page-metered | Yes |
 Perplexity AI | $20/mo | Freemium | Yes |
 You.com (this page) | $5 per 1,000 calls | Pay as you go | Yes |
