An Outscraper alternative without surprise bills
CrustAPI is an Outscraper alternative built on prepaid credits. Buy a pack, spend a credit when a query returns results, keep the rest forever. There is no end-of-month invoice.
Where Outscraper is strong
Outscraper covers a lot of ground. Google Maps, Google reviews, and scrapers for many other sites and services, all under one account. Pricing is per record, and there is a web interface, so people who never touch code can still pull data. That breadth is real. If your project needs data from five different platforms, Outscraper is a fair pick and we will not pretend otherwise.
CrustAPI is narrower on purpose. We cover two sources, Google and public LinkedIn, and we work on being the simplest and fastest way to get those two. If that is the data you need, keep reading.
Month-end billing is where trust breaks
Outscraper bills the way a utility does. You use services through the month, and the charge arrives at the end of it. When usage is steady, that model is fine. But the complaint that shows up again and again on review sites is a month-end charge the customer did not expect. A script loops harder than planned, a task pulls more records than intended, and the invoice reflects it weeks later.
CrustAPI removes the mechanism. Credits are prepaid. You buy a pack, the balance sits in your dashboard, and each result subtracts one credit. When the balance hits zero, requests stop until you top up on purpose. There is nothing to invoice later, so there is nothing to be surprised by.
Two more rules keep the math clear. You are charged only when a query returns results, so failed and empty queries cost nothing. And credits never expire, so a pack bought for one project waits for the next one.
One request, real response
The response is synchronous JSON, and about 1 second is typical for maps. Set limit up to 100 businesses per search, and add stars=true for the 1-to-5 review histogram per place. Swap type=maps for type=reviews to pull the reviews themselves, at roughly 0.3 seconds per call.
Outscraper vs CrustAPI
Outscraper's side is described in plain terms from their public site and public reviews; check their pricing page for current rates. Our side uses our published numbers.
| Outscraper | CrustAPI | |
|---|---|---|
| Billing model | Pay as you go, invoiced at the end of the month | Prepaid credit packs, top up when you choose |
| Surprise-bill risk | The bill lands after the spend; month-end charge complaints are common on review sites | Requests stop at zero balance. There is nothing to invoice later |
| Pricing unit | Per record, with rates that differ by service and volume tier | One flat credit per search on every type; Maps bills 1 credit per business returned |
| Queries that return nothing | See their per-service pricing | Free. You are charged only when results come back |
| Credit expiry | Postpaid, so no credits to expire | Credits never expire |
| Coverage | Wide: Google plus many other sites and services | Google (12 search types) and public LinkedIn (people, profiles, companies, jobs, posts) |
| Speed | Many jobs run as queued tasks, built for big batches | Synchronous JSON: maps ~1s, reviews ~0.3s, web search p50 ~1.2s |
| Free tier | Free monthly usage on many services | 3,000 queries a month, no card |
| Who answers support | A support team | Dawson, the founder. Mail to support@crustapi.com lands in his inbox |
Checked July 17, 2026. We keep the Outscraper column qualitative on purpose: their rates vary by service and change over time, and we would rather send you to their pricing page than quote a stale number.
A few of those punch above their weight. type=images returns about 97 images per credit. type=reviews answers in roughly 0.3 seconds. And the LinkedIn people results can carry a verified work email, which the next section explains.
One credit per successful call, prepaid
Prepaid packs, and credits never expire: 25k for $49 · 100k for $149 · 500k for $549 · 2.5M for $1,999, all self-serve, ex-tax. Every type bills one flat credit per search, except Maps, which bills one credit per business returned: a maps search that returns 40 businesses costs 40 credits. A search that returns none costs nothing. The free tier is 3,000 queries a month with no card, so you can test the data before spending a dollar.
Maps records have no emails. Here is where emails live.
Google Maps listings do not show email addresses, so our maps records do not include them. A maps record carries name, address, phone, website, rating, review count, categories, and hours. If a tool promises emails straight from a maps listing, ask where those emails actually come from.
On CrustAPI, verified emails come from the LinkedIn people endpoints. Search people by title, company, or keyword; when a work address passes verification you get it, and when it does not, the field returns null instead of a guess.
Pair the two and you get a clean loop: pull the businesses with the Google Maps scraper API, then find the people behind them with the LinkedIn people search API.
Related: Google Reviews API · Google Places API alternative · SerpApi alternative
When Outscraper is the better pick: your project needs platforms we do not cover (their menu goes well past Google), you want emails harvested from business websites at scale, or you prefer scheduled batch tasks in a web UI over calling an API. Those are real jobs, and their tool fits them. Our pitch is only for people whose data lives in Google or public LinkedIn and who want prepaid, no-surprise billing.
Common questions
Clay
Load a pack once. Spend it whenever.
Start on the free 3,000 credits, run a real search, and read the JSON that comes back. No card, and never an invoice.
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