Pricing
Credits model, per-request costs, tier table, and per-org caching.
Serpex uses a pay-as-you-go credits model. You buy a block of credits; each API request consumes a small number of credits.
Per-request credit cost
| Request type | Credits |
|---|---|
Search (POST /api/search) | 1 credit |
Extract (POST /api/crawl) | 1 credit per URL |
Errors are never charged. A search that returns no results is charged only when the query genuinely has no results — confirmed across multiple search sources — and is never charged when we could not confirm that (in practice, mainly site: queries can be confirmed today). See When are empty results charged?. Check metadata.credits_used in every response to see exactly what was deducted.
Pricing tiers
Larger top-ups unlock a lower effective price per 1,000 requests:
| Tier | Top-up amount | Price per 1k requests |
|---|---|---|
| Starter | $5 – $49 | ~$0.80 |
| Standard | $50 – $499 | ~$0.65 |
| Scale | $500 – $1,999 | ~$0.50 |
| Enterprise | $2,000+ | Contact sales |
Each top-up's rate is set by the size of that top-up: a $500 top-up buys credits at ~$0.50 per 1,000, and a later $20 top-up at ~$0.80. Credits never expire, whatever rate they were bought at. Your rate limit tier is set separately, by your largest single completed purchase.
At 10 million searches a month and up, volume pricing starts from $0.20 per 1,000, prepaid. Contact sales for a quote.
New accounts receive 200 free credits to explore the API without a credit card.
Per-org caching
Repeats are free per organization. If your code (or any key in the same organization) repeats a request within 5 minutes of the request that was charged, no credits are charged (credits_used: 0). A repeat means:
- Search: the same query text with the same content options (plain,
content_results: 5orcontent_results: 10). - Extract: the same URL with the same
format. Free URLs are counted inmetadata.cached_free.
from_cache on a search response only tells you whether the results were served from our cache. It is not a billing flag: read credits_used to see what you paid.
Free repeats are per organization: a different organization making the same request still pays. Only your own repeats within the 5 minute window are free.
This makes development iteration and idempotent retries cheap:
{
"metadata": {
"credits_used": 0
}
}Managing credits
- Buy credits: go to Billing in the dashboard and select a top-up amount.
- Check balance: the dashboard shows your current balance and usage history.
- Low-credit alerts: Serpex sends an email and Slack notification when your balance falls below 10% of your last top-up amount (or below 200 credits on the free tier).
See also
Visit serpex.dev/pricing for the full pricing page, including an interactive credit calculator.