Top 10 SerpApi alternatives and competitors (2026)
Most roundups repeat marketing pages. We pulled every vendor's live pricing, decoded the credit multipliers, and ran paid benchmarks against SerpApi itself.
Real per-search prices
Free tiers compared
Bias disclosed up front
tldr.txt
→ crustapi tops our list: never-expiring credits, empties free, 3,000 free monthly (yes, it's ours)
→ serper for the cheapest raw entry credit; dataforseo for cheap async bulk
→ most alternatives cut SerpApi's $25 per 1,000 by 80 to 95 percent
! stay on SerpApi if you need engines beyond Google or their U.S. Legal Shield
SerpApi is the most established SERP API: 100+ APIs across roughly 19 engines and platforms, SOC 2, and a U.S. Legal Shield on bigger plans. People go looking for alternatives for two repeat reasons: the price ($25 per 1,000 searches at entry, $9.17 at their biggest listed plan) and the subscription model, where unused searches vanish every month.
Every option below is compared on the number that matters: dollars per 1,000 real Google searches, from each vendor's live pricing page. We also ran paid benchmarks against SerpApi from a real account.
ALL TEN, ONE TABLE
Real price per 1,000 Google searches
| API | Entry / 1k | At scale / 1k | Free tier | Unused credits | Official MCP |
|---|
| CrustAPI | $1.96 | $0.40 | 3,000 / month | Never expire | Yes, + CLI + x402 |
| SerpApi (for reference) | $25.00 | $9.17 | 250 / month | Reset monthly | Yes |
| Serper | $1.00 | $0.30 | 2,500 on signup | Valid 6 months | No |
| SearchApi | $4.00 | $1.00 | 100 to start | Monthly quota | Yes |
| DataForSEO | $2.00 live / $0.60 async | Flat at any volume | $1 trial | Funds never expire | Yes |
| Bright Data | $1.50 | ~$1.31 | 5,000 / month | Monthly on plans | Yes |
| Scrapingdog | $1.00 light / $2.00 full | $0.14 at $30k/mo | 200 credits (40 searches) | Reset monthly | No |
| HasData | $2.45 | $0.83 | 100 searches / month | Monthly quota | Yes |
| ScraperAPI | $12.25 (25 credits per search) | ~$2.30 | 200 searches trial | Reset monthly | Yes |
| Zenserp | $2.00 | $0.90 | 50 / month | Reset monthly | No |
| Tavily (not Google) | $7.50 | $5.00 | 1,000 / month | Monthly quota | Yes |
All prices normalized to successful Google searches from each vendor's live pricing page, July 12, 2026. Where a vendor bills multiple credits per search, we did that math for you. Something stale? Email support@crustapi.com and we'll fix it.
SO YOU CAN CHECK OUR WORK
How we picked
- We pulled every vendor's live pricing page on July 12, 2026, and normalized to real Google searches. Where a vendor bills 5, 10, or 25 credits per search, we did that math for you.
- We ran paid benchmarks against SerpApi and serper from real accounts, published at SerpApi receipts and serper receipts.
- Every entry links to the vendor's own site so you can check them directly, and ratings are only cited where the review count means something.
- We build CrustAPI, so we're first on our own list. Every claim about us is checkable on the same terms as everyone else.
Yes, ours, so read this entry knowing that. CrustAPI is a Google-only data API: twelve surfaces (web, maps, places, news, shopping, images, videos, scholar, patents, autocomplete, reviews, webpage) behind one endpoint, returning serper-compatible JSON.
Against SerpApi the trade is simple: about a tenth of the price at entry, and a twentieth at scale, for the same Google data, prepaid instead of a subscription. Credits never expire, empty and failed searches cost nothing, and the free tier refills monthly.
Entry$1.96 / 1k
At scale$0.40 / 1k
Free tier3,000 / month
CreditsNever expire
AgentsMCP · CLI · x402
The honest cons: Google only (SerpApi covers 100+ APIs across roughly 19 engines and platforms), no U.S. Legal Shield, no AI Overview field yet, and it launched in 2026, so the track record is short. The full head-to-head with benchmark receipts: CrustAPI vs SerpApi.
The price-and-speed leader among direct SerpApi rivals: Google results in 1 to 2 seconds, prepaid credits instead of a subscription, and 13 API endpoints across the Google menu. At $1.00 per 1,000 at entry, falling to $0.30 per 1,000 on the biggest pack, the raw rate is the lowest headline number in the category.
Entry$1.00 / 1k
At scale$0.30 / 1k
Free tier2,500 on signup
CreditsValid 6 months
AgentsNo official MCP
Watch out for: credits are valid for six months, then they're gone, and a zero-result search still bills 1 credit (we tested it). Our full comparison: CrustAPI vs Serper.
A quality-focused SERP API covering Google plus 60+ engines, with clean 1-request-per-search billing and a hosted MCP exposing 83 tools. The closest thing to a middle ground between raw-credit pricing and SerpApi's engine breadth.
Entry$4.00 / 1k
At scale$1.00 / 1k
Free tier100 to start
CreditsMonthly quota
AgentsOfficial MCP
Watch out for: an hourly throttle of 20% of your plan caps bursts, and getting under $2 per 1,000 needs more than $500 a month committed.
Pay-as-you-go SEO data infrastructure for people building rank trackers and SEO tools. The cheapest bulk Google data on this list, if you can live with an async task queue, and deposited funds never expire, which is genuinely rare.
Async$0.60 / 1k
Real-time$2.00 / 1k
Free tier$1 trial
FundsNever expire
AgentsOfficial MCP
Watch out for: the billing model takes real study. Each unit covers 10 results (depth-100 queries cost 10x), search operators bill 5x, and the cheap rate rides a POST-then-poll workflow with a $50 minimum deposit.
The enterprise proxy giant's SERP product: Google plus six other engines across 195 countries, rated 4.7/5 on G2 (330 reviews, company-wide). Built for teams already living on their platform.
Entry$1.50 / 1k
At scale~$1.31 / 1k
Free tier5,000 / month
CreditsMonthly on plans
AgentsOfficial MCP
Watch out for: "pay only for success" means successful delivery, and their published billing exempts only failed requests, not empty results. Setup also runs through their full platform dashboard, which is heavy for a solo developer.
A general scraping suite (40+ endpoints from LinkedIn to Amazon) with a Google SERP API inside, all drawing on one credit pool, rated 4.7/5 on Trustpilot (585 reviews). Compelling if you want many scrape targets on one bill.
Entry, light$1.00 / 1k
Advance tier$2.00 / 1k
Free tier40 searches
Per search5 to 10 credits
AgentsNo official MCP
Watch out for: the 5-to-10x credit multiplier means headline credit counts overstate Google capacity, and monthly credits reset on your billing date.
A scraping platform whose Google SERP API covers 15+ SERP features including AI Overviews, with proxies and rendering handled. Mid-pack pricing once you decode the credits, and they state plainly that failed requests are never charged.
Entry$2.45 / 1k
At scale$0.83 / 1k
Free tier100 / month
Per search10 credits
AgentsOfficial MCP
Watch out for: the 10-credit multiplier makes plan numbers look 10x bigger than they are, and credits are monthly allotments with no documented rollover.
A popular general-purpose scraping API with a structured Google endpoint, rated 4.5/5 on Trustpilot. Great product for scraping arbitrary sites; expensive specifically for Google.
Entry$12.25 / 1k
At scale~$2.30 / 1k
Free tier200 searches trial
Per search25 credits
AgentsOfficial MCP
Watch out for: that 25x Google multiplier is the biggest gap between headline credits and real searches on this list, and unused credits reset at renewal.
A straightforward SERP API covering Google, Bing, Yandex, YouTube, and DuckDuckGo with honest 1-request-per-search billing. Simple, if unremarkable.
Entry$2.00 / 1k
At scale$0.90 / 1k
Free tier50 / month
Per search1 credit
AgentsNo official MCP
Watch out for: quotas reset monthly with no rollover, and the near-zero independent review footprint means little outside signal either way.
10. Tavily (and Exa) tavily.com
A different animal: Tavily searches its own index and returns LLM-ready chunked content for AI agents, not Google rankings. Exa plays the same position.
Entry$7.50 / 1k
At scale$5.00 / 1k
Free tier1,000 / month
IndexOwn, not Google
AgentsOfficial MCP
Watch out for: no Google rank positions, local pack, or shopping SERPs. If your job is Google data, this isn't it; if your job is grounding an LLM, it's built for exactly that.
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