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Brave Search API

Independent search index API — not Google, not Bing.

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About

The Brave Search API (brave.com/search/api) is search from an independent index — Brave crawls its own web, so results don't depend on Google or Bing.

Usage-based pricing. The pick when you want search results free of Big Tech ranking influence, or a fallback index for agent research pipelines.

What it can do

  • Independent web index
  • Web + image + news search
  • Usage-based pricing
  • Privacy-respecting
  • Goggles (custom ranking)

Setup

  1. Sign up for a Brave Search API key.
  2. Query the web search endpoint.
  3. Combine with Exa/Tavily for coverage.

Prerequisites

API key.

Use cases

automationdata

Works with

Generic APIAny agent (.md)

Trust score — 7/10

/10 trustMetrics-checked

Scored 7/10 (metrics tier). Genuinely independent index with a real API, but smaller developer mindshare than Exa/Tavily. Proprietary, provider-estimated adoption. Metrics tier.

How the trust score is built

Full methodology →
Adoption · stars/downloads, log-scaled vs peers
7.0/10
Maintenance · recency, releases, issue load
7.0/10
Openness · license + docs
4.5/10
Manual review · sanity read + red-flag check
7.0/10
  • · provider-tier estimate — thinner evidence (no public adoption metric)
  • · independent search index API; no public repo — adoption estimated
  • · released 285 days ago
  • · manual review: Brave Search API — independent index (not Google/Bing); usage-based pricing; license: proprietary

Sources

Every fact above was checked against these sources. Where a claim comes from the provider and couldn't be independently verified, the text says so.